INVESTMENT

Is the Italian Prime minister selling the team to pay a $800 million fine?

Morgan Stanley beat Wall Street's estimates, but the company still reported a quarterly loss Thursday before the opening bell. Morgan Stanley's bright spot was an increase in trading revenue.

The Chinese economy is facing the risk of inflation and property price bubble, say IMF economists, though the imminent danger of a major downturn in the property sector has been ruled out.

Apple reported its best-ever results in its fiscal third quarter Tuesday. On Wednesday investors applauded by driving Apple's stock to near it's all-time high.

BlackRock Inc , the world's largest money manager by assets, marshaled a rapidly growing list of fund styles and asset classes to post a 43 percent jump in second-quarter profit, topping expectations.

Apple is hoarding $76 billion in cash. George Soros' hedge fund (run by Keith Anderson) is nearly holding $20 billion in cash, or 75 percent of the assets under management, reported Bloomberg, citing unnamed sources.

Carl Icahn continues in his takeover attempt of Clorox (CLX), this time bumping up his original bid to $10.7 billion.

Nokia is scheduled to report its second-quarter results on July 21 before the market opens.

BlackRock Inc , the world's largest money manager by assets, marshaled a rapidly growing list of fund styles and asset classes to post a 43 percent jump in second-quarter profit, topping expectations.

Cnooc said it agreed to acquire Canadian oil sands company Opti Canada Inc. for $2.1 billion in cash and debt.

The top after-market NYSE gainers on Tuesday are: Vmware, Dex One, Advance America, Wabash National, EMC Corp and Steelcase Inc. The top after-market NYSE losers are: Chipotle Mexican Grill, Government Properties Income Trust, Royal Bank Scotland Group, Motorola Mobility Holdings, Lear Corp and Gray Television.

The unveiling of the Spaceport America brand brings to light the visionary project which took many years to complete.

Google's stock popped last week when the company surprised investors with strong numbers. Apple is expected to post similarly strong numbers, but the market may have already figured that in to Apple's stock price.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is pushing for increased security and nuclear agreements with India, as she visits the subcontinent for a three-day visit.

A U.S. Government default must be avoided by Washington lawmakers at all costs, former U.S. Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers underscored, as it would trigger a financial panic worse than that precipitated by the collapse of Lehman Brothers in late 2008.

Australian investment banker Macquarie Group is expected to slash up to one-thousand jobs amidst a slowdown in M&A activity and tepid global market conditions.

Charles Schwab Corp said quarterly earnings rose 16 percent as asset management fees and interest revenue offset a slowdown in client trading.

Spot gold prices touched a new record high of $1598.41 on Monday, extending the longest rally in about 40 years. The latest wind in the tail came from worsening worries of a European sovereign crisis and the painful stalemate in the US debt ceiling talks that has raised the specter of an unprecedented Treasury default.

Hedge fund firm Man Group is to buy exposure to the estates of defunct U.S. bank Lehman Brothers from funds run by its GLG unit for $355 million, in an effort to clean up the funds' holdings and make them easier to sell to new investors.

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Sunday's Day 8 of the debt deal talks saw both sides express confidence that a grand bargain deficit reduction package would be reached, even as a parallel camp of lawmakers worked on a last-chance option containing a more-modest reduction; however, there was little new evidence Sunday that a deal was at hand.