AFP - British finance minister Gordon Brown announced on Wednesday that he would cut the basic rate of income tax in Britain from 22 percent to 20 percent in April 2008.
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Reuters - Caught between stubbornly elevated U.S. inflation and signs of weaker economic growth, the Federal Reserve is expected to hold interest rates steady as it wraps up a two-day policy-setting meeting on Wednesday.
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AP - Claire’s Stores Inc. agreed to a $3.1 billion takeover proposal from New York-based private equity firm Apollo Management LP, the costume jewelry retailer said Tuesday.
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Reuters - Morgan Stanley posted a 60 percent jump in quarterly earnings on Wednesday, exceeding expectations on blowout results from debt and equity trading.
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Reuters - Morgan Stanley won a major victory on Wednesday when a Florida state appeals court threw out a $1.58 billion award to billionaire financier Ronald Perelman over his 1998 sale of camping equipment company Coleman Co. to Sunbeam Corp.
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Reuters - Package delivery company FedEx Corp. on Wednesday reported a dip in profit, citing a slower economic environment, lower fuel surcharges and severe winter storms, but came in above market expectations.
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Reuters - Fears that turbulence in the high-risk mortgage market would spread eased on Wednesday after two lenders managed to secure enough money to stay afloat.
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A health insurance exchange facilitates personal, portable insurance independent of the place of work; makes efforts to insure the uninsured more targeted and effective, breaking the cycle of rotation in and out of coverage and reducing the number of uninsured; and provides the administrative framework needed to reach the hardest to insure and cover them efficiently and effectively.