GERMANY

Newly installed Prime Minister Mario Monti got straight to work at the weekend, reviewing Italy's parlous finances before a round of meetings in coming days with European leaders to discuss the growing Eurozone debt crisis.

World Gold Council's third-quarter demand report showed central bank buying going far above most analysts estimates. Analysis shows the mystery buyers to be China or India.

Rising sovereign yields in Europe added to negative pressure for global equities during the week

As Libyan's celebrate Saif al-Islam's Friday capture, it brings to mind the question of what happened to all of Gaddafi's children.

This is clearly an austerity budget, as most member states are in the midst of a serious financial crisis, said EU budget commissioner Janusz Lewandowski.

A brutal year for global investors may get even worse next week should the U.S. Congress prove yet again it is too bitterly divided to deliver on its promise to cut the gaping federal budget deficit.

While German Chancellor Angela Merkel and British Prime Minister David Cameron have tried to put a happy face on their Friday meeting in Berlin, the two prominent European leaders differ sharply on ways to resolve the Eurozone debt crisis.

The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn -- Part 1 was released in theaters worldwide Friday, and this latest installment in the Twilight series is not to be missed.

The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn -- Part 1 was released in theaters worldwide Friday, and this latest installment in the Twilight series is not to be missed.

Charles Dickens will be feted around the world next year in literature, film, theater, music and art, underlining his international cultural impact 200 years after his birth.

Wine lovers will get their first taste of the much-talked about 2011 harvest on Thursday as the Beaujolais Nouveau hits the bars and shelves of France and the wider world.

The job cull would slash the number of bankers to 16,000.

Gold fell to a one week low on Thursday as fears that the euro zone debt crisis could spread from peripheral to core economies kept investors nervous and prompted some to liquidate profitable positions to cover losses in other asset classes.

General Electric, the biggest U.S. conglomerate, announced plans to hire as many as 400 more software engineers for a new global center in San Ramon, Calif. The company said it plans to spend as much as $1 billion on software development through 2015.

Superbugs capable of evading even the most powerful antibiotics are increasing their grip in Europe with rates of drug resistance in one type of bacteria reaching 50 percent in the worst-hit countries, health officials said Thursday.

With defected army soldiers attacking more buildings in Syria, Russia is calling for talks between President Bashar al-Assad and opposition leaders to end what is looking very much like a civil war.

So far, the dispensers of global financial justice -- the bond vigilantes -- have given the U.S. a pass on the budget deficit issue. But that can’t last forever, which is why it behooves Democrats and Republicans to reach agreement on a budget deficit reduction package now, starting with a super committee agreement.

Stock index futures pointed to a steady-to-lower open on Wall Street on Thursday, with futures for the S&P 500 flat, Dow Jones futures down 0.04 percent and Nasdaq 100 futures down 0.15 percent at 1055 GMT.

Spain and France struggled with government bond auctions on Thursday, throwing into sharp relief the threat of larger euro zone economies succumbing to the debt crisis that began in Greece and is already lapping at Italy's shores.

World stocks hit a one-week low on Thursday and Bunds rose as Spain paid more than at any time since 1997 to sell ten-year debt, sparking fears it may join other euro zone peripheral states in being unable to finance itself.

Asian shares wobbled Thursday as doubts deepened about Europe's ability to stop its sovereign debt crisis from spinning out of control, with Germany and France split over the European Central Bank's bond buying role.