The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission has questioned Congressional testimony by the architect of a proposed satellite radio merger.

The buyout of Clear Channel has become a test of wills between some of the nation?s largest investors.

Despite its extraordinary back story, Colors is one more restaurant fighting to survive in one of New York?s most competitive industries.

Public and private investments have turned Burlington, Vermont?s once-dilapidated waterfront into the city?s jewel.

Restrictions on the BBC had prevented it from publicizing developments in a scandal over allegations that honors had been traded for campaign contributions.

Reuters - Sony Corp. and Pioneer Corp. said on Wednesday they would delay their annual earnings reports by a few weeks as they grapple with the extra paperwork needed to comply with tougher U.S. accounting rules.

Australia's economy grew by 2.8% in the final three months of 2006, despite a severe drought.

Asian markets show signs of recovery but share prices in Tokyo reverse gains in late trading.

New ITV chairman Michael Grade admits the broadcaster must do better as it unveils a drop in annual profits.

Reuters - Citigroup's $10.8 billion tender offer to buy Nikko Cordial Corp. (8603.T) looks just sweet enough to convince investors in the Japanese brokerage to sell, analysts said on Wednesday.

Reuters - The chief executive of DaimlerChrysler (DCXGn.DE), Dieter Zetsche, said it would be difficult to break up Chrysler, as analysts and other experts have speculated recently, due to an integrated production system that binds together its various brands, The New York Times said.

Reuters - China will continue to achieve rapid but stable economic growth in 2007, the head of the National Development and Reform Commission, China's top economic planning agency, said on Wednesday.

Reuters - China Merchants Bank (3968.HK) (600036.SS), the country's biggest non-state lender, posted a more than 50 percent rise in its 2006 net profit, according to a copy of a speech by its chief executive Ma Weihua.

Stock markets show signs of recovery, but share prices in Tokyo reverse gains in late trading.

The national minimum wage is to rise by 17p - about 3% - from £5.35 to £5.52 an hour from October 2007.

Reuters - Kevin J. Martin, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, has privately questioned recent congressional testimony by the architect of a proposed merger of the nation's two satellite radio companies that subscribers would both pay the same monthly rate and receive significantly more programming, The New York Times reported.

Reuters - The chief executive of DaimlerChrysler (DCXGn.DE), Dieter Zetsche, said it would be difficult to break up Chrysler, as analysts and other experts have speculated recently, due to an integrated production system that binds together its various brands, The New York Times said.

AFP - US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said Wednesday the world's economy was in good shape despite stock market turmoil as he headed to China and talks on reforms and the currency.

Shares in Carrefour rise on a report that the French supermarket giant could dismiss its chairman Luc Vandevelde.

Fraud is costing the UK at least £20bn a year, or £330 for each person in the UK, a police study warns.

Oil company Cairn Energy is set to be demoted from the FTSE 100, following the latest reshuffle of the share index.

Reuters - DaimlerChrysler AG (DCXGn.DE) will not auction off loss-making U.S. division Chrysler and could decide to keep the business at the end of a strategic review, Chief Executive Dieter Zetsche told a German paper.

Reuters - French billionaire Bernard Arnault said on Wednesday he had taken a 9.1 percent stake in supermarket giant Carrefour jointly with U.S. private equity group Colony Capital.

Australia's economy grew by 2.8% in the final three months of 2006, despite the worst drought for 100 years.

Stock markets show signs of recovery, but share prices in Tokyo reverse gains in late trading.

The national minimum wage is to rise by 17p - about 3% - from £5.35 to £5.52 an hour from October 2007.

Reuters - U.S. private employers likely added 57,000 new jobs in February, about half of what economists had expected, according to a report released on Wednesday, indicating weakness in the labor market and a slowing economy.

Reuters - American Eagle Outfitters Inc said on Wednesday earnings for the crucial holiday quarter rose 40 percent as it benifitted from an additional week, strong comparable stores sales and good margins.

Reuters - U.S. mortgage applications jumped last week as borrowers emerged in droves to refinance their existing home loans as interest rates fell to their lowest since early December, an industry trade group said on Wednesday.

Reuters - Apparel retailer Talbots Inc. said on Wednesday that quarterly net profit fell, hurt by heavy markdowns and declining sales at its flagship Talbots chain.

Share prices may gyrate, but India?s exchanges are in full expansion mode.

Carrefour chairman Luc Vandevelde has quit the French supermarket giant, the Wall Street Journal says.

London will leapfrog Paris and Chicago to become the fourth largest world city economy by 2020, a report says.

German power firm E.ON says it may settle for a smaller stake in Spanish energy firm Endesa - or even drop its bid altogether.

Shares in internet gaming firm Sportingbet jump 15% after it says has received a takeover approach.

Stock markets are mixed in the wake of last week's global sell-off with US shares opening largely unchanged.

Reuters - Stocks were little changed on Wednesday as a push to buy beaten-down shares after a steep sell-off in the past week offset persisting concerns about growth and investors' appetite for risk.

Reuters - Ford Motor Co will consider adding production capacity in Russia to meet rising demand in Europe's fastest-growing major market, the head of the automaker's European operations said on Wednesday.

Reuters - Talbots Inc. said on Wednesday that quarterly net profit tumbled, hurt by heavy markdowns and declining sales at its flagship Talbots chain, sending its shares down nearly 15 percent in early electronic trading.

Share prices may gyrate, but India?s exchanges are in full expansion mode.

Carrefour chairman Luc Vandevelde quits the French supermarket giant as takeover rumours swirl.

The European Central Bank is expected to raise its interest rates by a quarter of a percentage point to 3.75%.

London will leapfrog Paris and Chicago to become the fourth largest world city economy by 2020, a report says.

Losses are narrowing at channel tunnel firm Eurotunnel, and the Anglo-French firm says it sees recovery ahead.

German power firm E.ON says it may settle for a smaller stake in Spanish energy firm Endesa - or even drop its bid altogether.

Corus shareholders overwhelmingly vote to accept a £5.75bn takeover offer from Indian firm Tata Steel.

Reuters - U.S. stocks were flat on Wednesday, held back by lingering concerns about growth and investors' appetite for risk in a choppy market.

Reuters - The carry trade in which global investors have borrowed cheaply in yen to buy higher-yielding assets elsewhere has got to turn around, said former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan on Wednesday.

Reuters - The state of Ohio said on Wednesday that it had reached a $144 million settlement with Time Warner Inc. on behalf of six state funds that claimed they were defrauded after the media conglomerate merged with the online service AOL.

Reuters - U.S. chief executives expect the economy to grow over the next six months, according to a quarterly survey by the Business Roundtable released on Wednesday.

AP - U.S. Treasury prices inched up in more sedate trading Wednesday amid calmer stock market activity.

Reuters - Mortgage applications jumped last week as borrowers emerged in droves to refinance existing home loans as interest rates fell to their lowest level since early December, an industry trade group said on Wednesday.

AP - Luc Vandevelde resigned as chairman of Carrefour SA in a shakeup that followed the disclosure that two new shareholders had acquired a nearly 10 percent stake in the world's second largest supermarket retailer.

US economic growth was largely 'modest' in February with some sluggishness, the Fed's Beige Book report says.

Carrefour chairman Luc Vandevelde quits the French supermarket giant as takeover rumours swirl.

Shares in internet gaming firm Sportingbet jump 15% after it says has received a takeover approach.

The DVDirect VRD-MC3 stresses two extremely important attributes: simplicity and reproduction quality.

Reuters - U.S. stocks slipped on Wednesday, as persistent concerns about slower growth and weakness in the housing market, amid a diminishing appetite for risk, spurred further selling of equities.

Reuters - A popular investment strategy where investors borrow cheaply in yen to buy higher-yielding assets elsewhere can only continue for so long, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said on Wednesday.

Reuters - Several U.S. regions noted slower economic growth in the last weeks of February but price pressures remained little changed despite tight labor markets, the Federal Reserve said on Wednesday.

Reuters - Nonbinding offers for the generics business of Merck KGaA , worth at least 4 billion euros ($5.3 billion), are due on Monday, a source close to the sale process told Reuters, confirming a newspaper report.

AP - Americans looking to reduce their federal income taxes this year will get help from several important tax law changes that have expanded credits and deductions.

AP - The nation's retailers, once hopeful for a strong spring selling season, are being forced to ratchet down their expectations after sales stalled amid the chill of February.

While a ?modest expansion? continued in most regions of the country from early January to late February, the Federal Reserve said that several areas have noticed a slowdown in growth.

Paul Secon opened seven Pottery Barn stores with his brother, but they never quite made a fortune from their enterprise.

Reuters - Stocks slipped on Wednesday following a negative assessment of the housing market from a large home builder and a Federal Reserve report indicated some U.S. regions were seeing slowing economic growth.

Reuters - Research In Motion Ltd. expects to be up to date with its regulatory filings shortly, but the BlackBerry maker needs more time as its accountants continue to grapple with a $250-million earnings restatement related to mistakes it made in granting stock options in the past.

Reuters - Discount carrier JetBlue Airways Corp. named a new chief operating officer on Wednesday, shoring up its management team just weeks after suffering a major service meltdown.

Almost four in 10 businesses do not employ a woman in a senior management position, a survey suggests.

Reuters - Express Scripts Inc. sweetened its bid for Caremark Rx Inc. on Wednesday after suffering two setbacks in its battle to wrest the rival pharmacy-benefit manager away from a $22.8 billion deal with CVS Corp.

Reuters - The Microsoft Corp. executive in charge of closing the gap on Web search leader Google Inc is leaving the company, a source familiar with the situation said on Wednesday.

Investor's Business Daily - The Business Roundtable, which includes the heads of some of the biggest U.S. companies, said its economic outlook index rose to 84.9, up from 81.9 in Q4 '06. In the Feb. 8-22 survey, 73% of CEOs polled expect sales to rise over the next 6 months vs. 69% in Q4. Capital spending plans also improved. But the net share of big firms planning to hire fell to 12% from 14%.

Investor's Business Daily - Fund managers have to pick stocks, but fund firms have to pick the stock pickers.

A consortium of investors disclosed that it intended to oust the board and possibly the top management of Take-Two Interactive Software.

A class-action lawsuit said the nation?s largest drugstore chain discriminated against thousands of black employees.

In getting European automakers to adhere to new limits on carbon dioxide emissions, Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany will have to take on the industry at home.

TXU Corporation?s decision to scrap plans for eight new coal-fired plants could leave Texas with a shortfall in energy.

When an heir steps in to run a start-up after an entrepreneur dies, it can be a difficult undertaking.

Express Scripts sweetened its $26.1 billion offer for Caremark Rx, but cautioned that the bid would be delayed by regulatory scrutiny.

It has become increasingly difficult to find a name for a company, a product, even a new shade of lipstick that has not been taken.

The decision to change its copyright policy covers about 50 percent of its material.

Pierre Omidyar named a new leader for his personal philanthropy as he explores ways to play a bigger role in shaping public policy.

Exxon said it would spend much of the record $39.5 billion it earned last year by increasing investment in oil and natural gas projects.

Lawmakers are questioning whether recently revised guidelines protect the confidentiality of legal communications and the right to legal counsel.

Bill Gates told Congress that overhauls of the nation?s schools and immigration laws are needed to keep jobs from going overseas.

The resignation fueled speculation of a shift in strategy at Carrefour, which is struggling to meet fierce competition at home and abroad.

The low-fare carrier named a chief operating officer, shoring up its management just weeks after suffering a service meltdown.

David D. French resigned over his involvement in the company?s past stock option grant practices.

Regulators froze a Latvian account suspected of being used to hack into online brokerage accounts and manipulate stock trading.

Officials expressed dismay over remarks by a British official who implied that London would not support the draft ?open skies? agreement.

Saks Inc. reported a fourth-quarter profit, reversing a year-earlier loss, as improved merchandise drove higher sales.

Investors sifted through new economic data and found little reason to resume last week?s heavy selling.

The German energy giant E.On said it might abandon a yearlong effort to take over the utility company Endesa of Spain.

JPMorgan Chase & Company and Citigroup said they were changing some cardholder rates and fees that lawmakers say unfairly hurt consumers.

Pressure mounted to cut import duties on wine and spirits after the United States said it had joined the European Union in asking the World Trade Organization to intervene in the matter. Mariann Fischer Boel, the agriculture commissioner for the union, who was in New Delhi, was set to meet the Indian commerce minister, Kamal Nath, to press the issue. On Tuesday, the United States trade representative, Susan C. Schwab, said Washington had filed a complaint with the W.T.O. on the tariffs, which are seen abroad as unfair trade barriers. India?s basic import duties of 100 percent on wine and 150 percent on spirits are within the W.T.O. limits, but federal surcharges and state-level taxes take the tariff up to 540 percent in some cases.

Vivendi said fourth-quarter profit dropped 51 percent from a year ago, when the company had a tax credit and asset sales. Vivendi, parent company of Universal Music, said it earned 610 million euros ($799 million) in the quarter, down from 1.25 billion euros. Revenue rose 1 percent, to 5.5 billion euros ($7.2 billion). Sales at Universal Music fell 1.5 percent.

A court ordered the YouTube Web site blocked throughout Turkey because of a video deemed insulting to Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey. The ban followed a week of what the news media termed a ?virtual war? of videos between Greeks and Turks on YouTube. The largest Internet provider, Turk Telecom, complied with the ban and cut off access to the site. Insulting Ataturk is a criminal offense in Turkey.

The largest shareholder in the Nikko Cordial Corporation has rejected a $10.8 billion takeover offer from Citigroup, saying that the price is too low. The shareholder, Harris Associates of Chicago, which manages money for individual and institutional investors, believes that Nikko is worth more than 2,000 yen a share, the chief investment officer, David G. Herro, said. The offer made by Citigroup was for 1,350 yen. The share price of Nikko, which is based in Tokyo, advanced 14 percent before the Citigroup offer was announced on Tuesday and it rose another 1.3 percent yesterday, closing at 1,357 yen a share. Harris owns about 7.5 percent of Nikko.

The economy grew 2.8 percent in the fourth quarter, the fastest rate in 18 months, lifted by household spending and a boom in construction and mining, the government statistics bureau said. But the treasurer, Peter Costello, said a drought, the worst in a century, had weighed on farming. Gross domestic product grew 2.8 percent from the fourth quarter of 2005 and by 1 percent from the third quarter, the bureau reported. The result surprised most market analysts, who had expected interest rate increases to constrain growth. Analysts had expected growth of 2 percent.

Paul Secon loaded the family station wagon in 1949 with ceramics, drove to Manhattan and opened the first Pottery Barn store.