Business and Finance news

The Bank of Japan downgraded its assessment of the economy for the first time in three months, saying growth is becoming “increasingly sluggish.”
“The increased sluggishness in Japan’s economic activity will likely persist over the next several quarters as the slowdown in overseas economies becomes more evident,” the central bank said in a report […]

Duke Energy Carolinas will partner with Progress Energy Inc. and the nonprofit Advanced Energy for a trial of new technology for plug-in electric cars.
Twelve Toyota Priuses will be modified for plug-in recharging and equipped with two-way technology for connecting to the electric grid. The goal is to make it possible for vehicles to charge overnight […]

The Contemporary Museum in Honolulu has been promised a collection of artwork worth nearly $2 million for the museum’s 20th anniversary.
The museum announced Friday that the former owner of The Honolulu Advertiser, Thurston Twigg-Smith, and his wife, Sharon, have promised their collection of work by contemporary artist H. C. Westermann.
The work includes one painting, 16 […]

U.S. stock markets declined Tuesday as investors braced for a raft of earnings following a better than 4 percent advance Monday. The Dow was down about 60 points at 10 a.m., to 9,204.58. Nasdaq was down about 14 points to 1,775.47.
More than one quarter of the companies in the S&P 500 are scheduled to release […]

Shares of Mosaic Co. dove Thursday, a day after it missed first-quarter earnings estimates and said it would trim its production forecast.
Shares of the Plymouth company, were down over 39 percent, to $40.62 on Thursday, after closing the previous day at $67.51 .
For the first-quarter Mosaic (NYSE: MOS) said late Wednesday it earned $1.18 billion, […]

The St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department board requested Friday that Missouri State Auditor Susan Montee conduct an audit into the police department’s former contract with St. Louis Metropolitan Towing.
In July, Police Chief Joe Mokwa retired amid a scandal about his daughter, Aimie Mokwa, using towed cars from St. Louis Metropolitan Towing, which contracted with the […]

FedEx Corp. said Thursday its fiscal first-quarter earnings fell 22%, but still met Wall Street’s expectations, as cost cuts partially offset the impact of slowing global growth.
The package delivery company also predicted it will beat analysts’ current expectations for its fiscal second quarter, and said it will hike shipping rates at its Express unit […]

The budget deficit will jump by $246 billion to $407 billion this year, the Congressional Budget Office estimates in a report released Tuesday.
"Over the long run, growing budget deficits and the resulting increases in federal debt would lead to slower economic growth," the agency said.
The budget deficit shot up 153% from last year’s shortfall […]

The U.K. economy is contracting for the first time in at least a decade, the National Institute for Economic and Social Research said.
Gross domestic product dropped 0.2 percent in the June to August period and fell 0.1 percent in the three months through July, the group, whose clients include the Bank of England […]

India's economy grew at the slowest pace since 2004 last quarter as the fastest inflation in a decade and increased borrowing costs damped consumer spending.
Asia's third-largest economy expanded 7.9 percent in the three months to June 30 from a year earlier, following an 8.8 percent gain in the previous quarter, the Central Statistical […]