Latest Business Wires

Japanese flocked to a large gymnasium in central Tokyo in recent weeks to see what for them was an unusual sight: senior bureaucrats being grilled over their budget requests for next year.

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin is holding talks aimed at deepening business and financial cooperation with France.

Germany's Volkswagen AG on Friday announced plans to invest euro2.3 billion ($3.5 billion) in Brazil and said it hopes to be building a million vehicles a year in the country by 2014.

An e-mail requesting an internship arrived at the Agriculture Department this summer with an impressive resume: Princeton University degree in operations research and financial engineering, 3.8 college GPA, 1520 SATs.

America's retailers are ushering in the traditional start of the holiday shopping season with expanded hours and deep discounts on everything from toys to TVs to lure crowds of shoppers.

Fashion designer Tommy Hilfiger's luxury estate in Connecticut has sold for $20 million, about $8 million below its original asking price.

New York's apple orchards are being carpeted with red as unpicked apples drop to the ground.

The bluish haze that has hung over the Third Street Diner's bar and booths for decades finally lifts next month as a new anti-smoking law takes hold in Virginia, a huge shift for a state whose tobacco habit dates to the Jamestown settlement some 400 years ago.

London Olympic organizers will avoid building a $66 million temporary arena after reaching an "agreement in principle" with two sports to move to an existing venue for the 2012 Games.

Honda Motor Co. set record production in Asia and China in October for the second straight month, leading a gradual and spotty recovery at Japanese automakers.

Beyond the noisy town hall meetings, Tea Party protests and sky-is-falling speeches characterizing much of the health care debate is a less visible, but no less intense push to broaden the face of the immigration reform movement.

Thousands of drivers on the nation's roads don't carry auto insurance, despite laws in all but two states requiring it. Critics of President Barack Obama's health overhaul plan ask: What are the chances scofflaws will treat a requirement to carry health insurance any differently?

Protesting peach farmers are blocking a major highway in northern Greece to press for higher subsidies.

While the U.S. Senate considers a climate bill aiming to dramatically slash air pollution linked to global warming, Texas Gov. Rick Perry and other Republican leaders in the state that leads the nation in greenhouse gas production are watching closely — and objecting loudly.

When Lori Fowlkes first saw robotic Zhu Zhu Pets toy hamsters in September, she remembers her kids started jumping up and down and saying "Please! Please! Can we buy them?"

British bookstore chain Borders U.K. has filed for a form of bankruptcy protection and is now looking for buyers for its stores, the administrators appointed to run the company said Thursday.

The Spanish-Argentine petroleum company Repsol says it plans to invest $1.5 billion to develop reserves and boost production in Bolivia.

Belgium's Flanders region said Thursday that a euro500 million ($754 million) loan for General Motors Co. is "not on the table" until it has more details on the future of the company's Antwerp plant.

RedPrairie Holding Inc., a business software provider, said Thursday it filed a registration statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission for an initial public offering.

News reports in Italy say investigators are scrutinizing millions of euros worth of Vatican bank transactions to see if they violated money laundering regulations.