Microsoft said Kevin Johnson, the executive in charge of its Windows and Web operations and an instrumental player in the company's failed $47.5 billion bid to buy Yahoo, is leaving the company.

Consumer products maker Newell Rubbermaid said on Tuesday that it would exit some product lines and raise prices to offset rapidly rising resin costs and protect profit margins.

Wachovia Corp, the fourth-largest U.S. bank, named Treasury Undersecretary Robert Steel chief executive on Wednesday, and said mortgage and legal problems will result in a $2.6 billion to $2.8 billion second- quarter loss, much larger than many analysts expected.

German industrial conglomerate Siemens  plans to cut around 4 percent of its workforce as part of an overhaul and as a result of the global economic downturn, Siemens said on Tuesday.

Shareholders of American International Group are demanding changes to the management and board of the world's largest insurer, which has been struggling with the fallout of the subprime mortgage mess.

Credit rating agencies will be banned from helping to design products they also grade as part of a tougher industry code of conduct to tackle issues raised by the U.S. subprime mortgage crisis such as conflicts of interest.

American International Group Chairman Robert Willumstad said Wednesday the global insurance giant's directors stand behind Chief Executive Martin Sullivan, fending off concerns raised by investors frustrated by two quarters of record losses.

Maurice "Hank" Greenberg, former chief executive of American International Group, has said the insurer is in "crisis" and urged a delay in its annual general meeting scheduled for Wednesday, according to a letter he sent to the board.

Shares in South Korea's Woori Finance Holdings jumped as much as 5 percent to a near 7-month high on Wednesday as news that its CEO was to step down boosted hopes that Privatization plans could be speeded up.

UBS shares rose over 5 percent on Friday on hopes the ailing Swiss bank will unveil job cuts next week to reverse breakneck expansion into investment banking which made it Europe's worst subprime victim.

Japan's Asahi Glass said on Thursday that it will close three North American factories and halt production at two others, battered by a U.S. housing market slump in the wake of the subprime mortgage crisis.

Shares of Swiss bank UBS rose 3.7 percent Friday as activist investor Luqman Arnold called for a restructuring of the company that would include a sale of its asset-management business.

Citigroup plans to split its consumer banking unit from its credit-card business as part of a broader reorganization to cut costs and simplify the large financial institution's structure, the company said Monday.

EBay said Thursday it is cutting 125 jobs in Europe and North America, including 70 positions at the online auctioneer's headquarters in San Jose, Calif.

Pest control to parcel delivery firm Rentokil Initial is parachuting in the management team that turned around chemicals group ICI in a bid to recover from two profit warnings that have hammered its shares.