IBT Staff Reporter

Britain's Cadbury Schweppes said on Friday it was extending the timetable for the sale of its North American drinks business due to the turbulence in debt markets, although it said buying interest was keen.

Oil steadied above $75 on Friday, supported by the fundamentals of energy supply and demand and shrugging off immediate worries over corporate borrowing costs and the U.S. economy that roiled stock markets.

High yielding currencies fell sharply in volatile markets on Friday as a sell-off in credit and stock markets led investors to pare risky carry trades.

Japan's Toshiba Corp., the world's No.2 maker of flash memory chips, posted a 1.6 percent rise in quarterly operating profit on Friday and raised its first-half forecast as chip prices recover.

Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group Inc. said net profit was roughly flat in the first quarter and stuck by its forecast for an earnings rebound for the full year, helped by an improvement in its bond portfolio and strong sales of investment trusts.

France's Michelin posted a 33.5 percent jump in first-half core operating income to 860.6 million euros ($1.2 billion), meeting forecasts, but its stock fell again on U.S. economic woes.

Congressional negotiators have agreed on legislation that would tie U.S. aid to Pakistan to significant progress by Islamabad in cracking down on al Qaeda, the Taliban and other militants, congressional sources said on Thursday.

The economic challenges of climate change will top the agenda when finance ministers of APEC's 21-members meet in the Queensland coastal resort of Coolum next week.

Shares in Czech drugmaker Zentiva fell more than 7 percent in early Friday trade after the company said first-half results would be lower than expected.

News and information provider Reuters Group Plc, which is being taken over by Canadian publisher Thomson Corp, posted a higher-than-expected interim trading profit and said sales were strong.

Target plans to carry only Blu-ray high definition DVD players through the holiday shopping season, a move that boosts the Sony-backed technology and may deal a blow to rival HD-DVD.

A battle of the bands is shaping up in the red-hot genre of musical video games, with a highly anticipated debut title set to take on a hit franchise for the collective rock 'n' roll soul of gamers.

Texas has the most entries on a list of the dirtiest U.S. power plants, while New England and the Pacific Coast make less carbon dioxide because they have fewer coal-burning plants, an environmental group said on Thursday.

A U.S. judge on Thursday struck down as unconstitutional a local law designed to crack down on illegal immigration, dealing a blow to similar laws passed by dozens of towns and cities across the country.

PepsiCo Inc. will spell out that its Aquafina bottled water is made with tap water, a concession to the growing environmental and political opposition to the bottled water industry.

Transocean Inc. and GlobalSantaFe Corp. earned a page in the innovative deals book earlier this week, carving a route around high oil sector valuations and tightening debt markets.

Pilots of a Comair jet that crashed in Kentucky, killing 49 people, failed to recognize obvious signs they were on the wrong runway -- one that was too short for safe takeoff, U.S. investigators said on Thursday.

Sony Corp. currently has no plans for a further price cut to its PlayStation 3 (PS3) game console following a $100 cut in the U.S., the electronics conglomerate's president said on Friday.

An Italian writer decided to put his mobile phone to good use during his daily commute to and from work -- by writing a book.

U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada sent a letter this week to four companies telling them not to build planned coal-burning power plants in his state.

The yen hit a three-month high against the dollar and a six-week high versus the euro on Friday as a sell-off in credit and stock markets forced investors to cut back on risky carry trades.

Microsoft Corp. Chief Executive Steve Ballmer defended the software company's expansion beyond its Windows and office software businesses, saying Web services and consumer devices are key to the company's future.

Mexico will use $206 million confiscated in what officials call the world's biggest drug cash seizure to fund programs for addicts and strengthen the justice system, the government said on Thursday.

The personal computer industry is on track to see 11.2 percent growth in shipments for the year, with notebook computers driving most of the momentum, according to one research firm.

Software giant Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) brokered a contract to host its advertisements on the popular Web 2.0 website Digg.com, ousting the former advertising partner Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG).

The Senate Finance Committee voted 20-1 on Thursday to give the U.S. government new tools to press China to raise the value of its currency, but the Bush administration said it opposed the bill.

Gap Inc. on Thursday named Glenn Murphy as its new chief executive and chairman, giving a respected former Canadian drug chain chief with no significant fashion industry experience the mandate to turn around the world's largest apparel retailer.

A patient who became ill following two experimental gene therapy injections for arthritis has died and U.S. health regulators are investigating the cause, officials said on Thursday.

Google Inc. has made its biggest move yet on the U.S. mobile Web market by signing a deal with Sprint Nextel Corp. that positions the Internet company to build services to run on Sprint's planned WiMAX high-speed wireless network.