IBT Staff Reporter

Alexion Pharmaceuticals Inc posted a narrower third-quarter loss, helped by sales of its key drug Soliris, sending its shares up nearly 8 percent in early electronic trade.

Merrill Lynch & Co Inc, which stunned Wall Street with $8.4 billion in write-downs in the third quarter, could have to write down another $4.5 billion in the current quarter, a Goldman Sachs analyst's report said on Thursday.

Travelers Cos Inc, the top writer of commercial auto and business insurance policies, said on Thursday that third-quarter profit rose 15 percent, helped by strong underwriting results.

British insurer Standard Life has made a mostly cash takeover bid for rival Resolution, valuing it at around 4.9 billion pounds ($10 billion), the two sides said on Thursday, confirming an earlier report.

China's biggest lender ICBC is to buy 20 percent of South Africa's Standard Bank for 36.67 billion rand ($5.6 billion) in cash, in the biggest foreign investment yet in Africa.

Motorola Inc on Thursday posted third-quarter earnings above Wall Street estimates and forecast a profit for the fourth quarter, raising expectations the mobile handset maker had begun to turn its business around. Shares of Motorola, which had fallen in the first two quarters of this year, rose 4.6 percent in premarket trading.

Stock futures rose on Thursday as results from mobile phone maker Motorola Inc and fellow tech leader EMC Corp helped ease worries about third-quarter earnings.

Honda Motor Co posted a forecast-beating 63 percent jump in quarterly earnings as strong sales of its new CR-V crossover made up for higher raw material costs, and it raised its full-year net profit forecast on a lower tax rate. Honda's factories are running at full capacity around the world -- including in Japan despite weak sales at home -- thanks to brisk demand for exports to North America and Europe.

Brent crude hit an all-time high and U.S. oil surged more than $1 towards $89 on Thursday, after a slide in U.S. oil stocks renewed fears of an energy crunch during the northern hemisphere's winter heating season.

The world's biggest jumbo jet landed safely in Sydney on Thursday, completing its long-delayed first commercial flight from Singapore.

The Bushehr nuclear power plant Russia is building for Iran will operate under the strict control of the United Nations' nuclear watchdog, a senior Russian official was quoted as saying on Thursday.

Turkish forces said they repelled a Kurdish rebel attack near the Iraqi border and President Abdullah Gul warned the PKK on Thursday that Turkey's patience was running out.

California wildfires that have destroyed 1,300 homes and forced the evacuation of 500,000 people raged into a fifth day on Thursday but firefighters seized on a break in the weather to largely halt the march of destruction.

Asian indexes were mixed Thursday, with financials dropping in Japan after Mizuho Financial Group reported losses related to U.S. subprime markets, while South Korean shares jumped on Samsung Securities a day after the brokerage firm announced strong earnings.

Countrywide Financial Corp. said on Wednesday that Henry Cisneros, a former U.S. Secretary of Housing and Development, resigned from its board of directors.

Wal-mart, the world's largest retailer is considering concentrating more on its international stores as well as opening up more stores in other countries for its business growth.

Hewlett-Packard unveiled an experimental data centre in Bangalore that boasts a 20 per cent reduction in power and cooling costs. The data centre uses thousands of heat sensors scattered throughout to direct cool air to where it is needed.

The semiconductor industry may be slowing down according to a new report released by the Fabless Semiconductor Association.

Information services company EMC will deliver third quarter earnings tomorrow morning however expectation is mixed.

Bank of America Corp on Wednesday said it planned to eliminate 3,000 jobs, and shook up its corporate and investment bank after a dismal quarter at that unit led to a 32 percent drop in overall profit.The second-largest U.S. bank said a majority of the cuts will be in corporate and investment banking, and the rest elsewhere. The cuts amount to 1.5 percent of the bank's 198,000-person workforce.

The chief executive officer of Wal-Mart Stores Inc said on Wednesday that he is optimistic about the Christmas season.

Expectations for a cut in U.S. interest rates rose on Wednesday as the housing market continued to show signs of weakness and the largest U.S. securities brokerage met with its first unprofitable quarter in nearly five years.

U.S. forces hope to hand over half of Baghdad to Iraqi security control by the end of 2008, after violence in Iraq dropped to its lowest level since January 2006, the No. 2 U.S. general in Iraq said on Wednesday.

The housing market took a sharp turn for the worse in September as prices tumbled and sales of previously owned homes fell to a record low, battered by rising foreclosures and tighter lending standards.

Ford Motor Co (F.N) and the United Auto Workers union have agreed on the broad terms of a new round of buyouts that would slash thousands of jobs under the terms of a new contract, people familiar with the ongoing talks said.

Stocks fluctuated sharply on Wednesday, first falling on reports of declining home sales and losses related to credit problems at Merrill Lynch but rising amid speculation that the Federal Reserve could lower interest rates.

The U.S. dollar continued to fall against the yen on Wednesday amid speculation that a struggling housing market will continue to have a negative impact on the U.S. economy, adding to the view that money policy makers will make another interest rate cut next week

Dying winds gave California firefighters their first big break on Wednesday after four days battling wildfires, but San Diego faced more calamity as blazes there burned out of control and kept more than half a million evacuees from returning home.

Stocks recovered from deep losses on Wednesday, amid talk that the Federal Reserve would act to cut the discount rate, the same day that Merrill Lynch rattled markets with its first loss in nearly six years.