Apple: iPad sales top 2 million since launch

CUPERTINO, Calif. – Apple Inc. said Monday that iPad sales have topped 2 million since its launch almost two months ago.

The Cupertino, Calif., company began selling the iPad on Friday in Asia and Europe. The iPad launched April 3 in the United States April 3.

The company does not publicly break out sales figures by region, according to Natalie Harrison, an Apple spokeswoman.

The company had previously said it sold 1 million iPads in the United States just 28 days after its launch. As a result of the strong demand at home, Apple had pushed back the start date of its international sales.

The iPad can be used to send e-mails, draw pictures and play games cash advance in one hour. It can also be used as an electronic reader. The basic model costs $499 in the United States, not including extras.

This past weekend, Apple began selling iPads in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.

The company said the device will be available in nine more countries in July and additional countries later this year.

Apple: iPad sales top 2 million since launch

J. Crew doubles 1Q net income, raises guidance

NEW YORK – Catalog retailer J. Crew Group Inc. doubled its first-quarter net income as revenue soared nearly 20 percent and raised its guidance for the year above estimates.

The clothing retailer said Thursday it earned $44.7 million, or 68 cents per share, in the three months that ended May 1. In the same period last year the company earned $20.4 million, or 32 cents per share.

The latest results beat a 57-cents-per-share prediction of analysts polled by Thomson Reuters.

Revenue rose 19.7 percent in the quarter to $413.9 million from $345.8 million. Analysts had expected $394.2 million.

Revenue at stores open at least a year rose 15 percent during the quarter. The metric is a key measure of retailer performance because it is not skewed by new store openings and closings payday advance.

The retailer of preppy clothing raised its guidance for the year, saying it now expects to earn between $2.35 to $2.45 a share, up from previous guidance of between $2.20 and $2.30.

Analysts expect earnings per share of $2.34 for the year on revenue of $1.73 billion.

J. Crew also offered initial second quarter guidance of earnings per share to range from 40 to 45 cents. Analysts expect earnings per share of 44 cents, according to Thomson.

J. Crew shares rose $1.73 to close at $43.86 on Thursday.

J. Crew doubles 1Q net income, raises guidance

US jobless claims dip

WASHINGTON (AFP) – New claims for jobless insurance benefits in the United States fell in the past week but remain at a relatively high level, according to government data published Thursday.

Claims dipped by 14,000 to 460,000 in the week ending May 22 from the previous week's revised figure of 474,000, the Labor Department said.

Most analysts had expected claims to fall to 455,000.

"Though still elevated from the trend of recent weeks past, this is a reassuring sign that the past week's increase was likely not the beginning of a new trend," said Andrew Gledhill, an economist with Moody's Economy.com.

Last week, the Labor Department reported that claims had risen for the first time in five weeks during the week to May 15, fueling concerns that a key cog of the US recovery is faltering.

Unemployment at nearly 10 percent is posing a major threat to recovery from the most severe recession in decades cash till payday advance.

The department also said that the four-week moving average for the jobless insurance claims, a less volatile indicator than the week-to-week figures, rose to 456,500 from the previous week's revised average of 454,250.

The latest data showed a drop in the total number of Americans receiving unemployment benefits.

During the week to March 15, that figure hit 4.607 million, a decrease of 49,000 from the preceding week's revised level of 4.656 million.

The United States has lost more than eight million jobs since the economy entered recession in December 2007.

US jobless claims dip

Amid regal pomp, UK government sets out program

LONDON – Queen Elizabeth II delivered a somber message of austerity Tuesday in a speech outlining the plans of Britain's new coalition government — setting out a program for sharp curbs to public spending, new regulation of the financial sector and changes to the centuries-old political system.

The queen wore a crown studded with 2,000 diamonds for the annual pageant of power, pomp and politics — featuring canon fire, cavalry, red-jacketed Yeoman warders and glittering carriages.

Delivering her address, drafted by government officials on her behalf, the queen said Britain would seek to immediately tackle a record national deficit. Public sector net borrowing for the fiscal year ending April 5 was 154.5 billion pounds ($233 billion).

"The first priority is to reduce the deficit and restore economic growth," the queen said, addressing legislators from a throne in the House of Lords.

Under the 18-month program, the Bank of England will take over regulation of financial services and a new independent Office of Budget Responsibility will handle economic forecasts. There will be a review over raising the state pension age, a planned increase in payroll taxes will be scrapped, and a new tax levied on banks. Immigration from outside the European Union will be capped.

The government will hold a referendum on making Britain's voting system more proportional and introduce fixed, five-year parliamentary terms. Currently, a prime minister choses when to end a parliamentary session and call an election — typically waiting for the most politically advantageous date.

Those measures follow last year's scandal over lawmakers' excessive expense claims and are intended to "restore trust in democratic institutions and rebalance the relationship between the citizen and the state," the queen said.

She confirmed an unpopular 5.1-billion-pound ($7.3 billion) plan for national identity cards will be dropped. An initial package of 6 billion pounds ($8.7 billion) in other spending cuts were outlined Monday.

The queen confirmed that she and Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, will visit Canada in June and travel to New York to visit the United Nations in July payday advance low fees.

In a debate following the monarch's address, Prime Minister David Cameron acknowledged cuts to spending will be tough, and likely unpopular — but looked to pin the blame on Britain's ousted leader Gordon Brown, saying he had offered "not one word of apology for the appalling mess that has been left in this country."

Sitting alongside Nick Clegg, the deputy prime minister and Liberal Democrat leader , Cameron also offered a tough stance over Iran's nuclear program, backing plans for harsher international sanctions. "I believe it is time to ratchet-up that pressure and the timetable is short," Cameron said.

Hundreds of people crowded streets outside Parliament to watch the queen's horse-drawn carriage parade from Buckingham Palace. Sailors bearing bayonet-tipped rifles lined her route, and silver-helmeted cavalry cantered behind.

The annual pageant draws heavily on the history of a power struggle between the monarchy and Parliament. Lawmakers are summoned from the House of Commons to listen to the queen by an official known as Black Rod — but only comply after first slamming the door in his face to symbolize their independence.

Since King Charles I tried to arrest members of the House of Commons in 1642 — and ended up deposed, tried and beheaded — the monarch has been barred from entering the Commons.

Britain's new coalition government — an unlikely partnership between the center-right Conservatives and their junior allies, the center-left Liberal Democrats — was formed following an election on May 6 that denied all parties an outright majority. Cameron's Conservatives have returned to office for the first time since 1997, ousting the Labour Party after 13 years.

Amid regal pomp, UK government sets out program

U.S. government angry that BP missed deadlines

HOUSTON (Reuters) – The U.S. government is frustrated and angry that BP Plc has missed "deadline after deadline" in its efforts to seal a blown-out oil well in the Gulf of Mexico, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said on Sunday.

BP has agreed to pay cleanup costs beyond the $75 million liability limit set by current U.S. law, Salazar told reporters after visiting BP's U pay day loan lenders.S. headquarters in Houston.

"If we find they're not doing what they're supposed to be doing, we'll push them out of the way appropriately," Salazar said.

(Reporting by Chris Baltimore; Editing by Will Dunham)

U.S. government angry that BP missed deadlines

Hot News:

European Debt Crisis Could Touch A.I.G.

The waves of financial trouble rippling across Europe could end up splashing at least one American institution: the taxpayer-owned American International Group.

A.I.G. has sought to unwind its derivatives business, which gave it a big exposure to Europe.

After an outcry over details disclosed last year about how the government’s bailout helped a number of European banks, the company intended to rid itself of the derivatives it sold to those institutions to help them comply with their capital requirements.

But its latest quarterly filing with regulators shows that the insurance behemoth still has significant exposure to those banks. A.I.G. listed the total notional value of these derivatives, credit-default swaps, as $109 billion at the end of March. That means if events in Europe turned sharply against A.I.G., its maximum possible loss on these derivatives would be $109 billion.

No one is suggesting that is likely.

Still, it would be a sore spot if A.I.G. once again had to make good on a European bank’s investment losses, even on a small scale. A spokesman for A.I.G., Mark Herr, declined to name the European banks that bought its swaps to shore up their capital.

A.I.G.’s stock has also fallen in recent days amid uncertainty over whether the continuing European debt crisis could set back an important, $35.5 billion asset sale. A.I.G.’s chief executive, Robert Benmosche, announced in March that the company would sell its big Asian life insurance business to Prudential of Britain, raising money to pay back part of its rescue loans.

The transaction needs the approval of 75 percent of Prudential’s shareholders.

Shares of A.I.G. fell seven consecutive trading days to close at $34.81 on Thursday. That was a drop of 23 percent since May 11. The shares recovered slightly on Friday, closing at $35.96.

A.I.G.’s swaps work something like bond insurance. The European banks that bought them could keep riskier assets on their books without running afoul of their capital requirements, because the insurer promised to make the banks whole if the assets soured cheap pay day loans. The contracts call for A.I.G.’s financial products unit to pay in cases of bankruptcy, payment shortfalls or asset write-downs.

A.I.G. is also required to post collateral to the European banks under certain circumstances, but the company said it could not forecast how much.

It was the collateral provisions of a separate portfolio of credit-default swaps that caused A.I.G.’s near collapse in September 2008. Those swaps were tied to complex assets whose values were hard to track.

The European bank assets now in question consist mostly of pooled corporate loans and residential mortgages. A.I.G. has said they are easier to evaluate and therefore less risky.

A.I.G. had hoped these swaps would become obsolete at the end of 2009, when European banking was to have completed its adoption of a detailed new set of capital-adequacy rules, known as Basel II. Since A.I.G.’s swaps were designed to help banks comply with the more simplistic prior regime, the insurer thought they would serve no useful purpose after the changeover and could be terminated without incident.

But international bank regulators have yet to fully adopt Basel II. A.I.G.’s first-quarter report said “it remains to be seen” which capital-adequacy rules would be used in different parts of Europe. Mr. Herr said A.I.G. could not comment beyond the information already filed with regulators. In its first-quarter report, the insurer said the banks were holding the loans and mortgages in blind pools, making it hard to know how they would weather Europe’s storm. Some pools have fallen below investment grade.

A.I.G. said the pools of loans and mortgages were not generally concentrated in any industry or country. They have an expected average maturity, over all, of a little less than two years. The company said it was getting regular reports on the blind pools and losses so far had been modest.

European Debt Crisis Could Touch A.I.G.

Salazar: Abolish energy agency, divide in 3 parts

WASHINGTON – The Obama administration moved on Wednesday to abolish the beleaguered agency that oversees offshore drilling and replace it with three separate entities.

The plan by Interior Secretary Ken Salazar would eliminate the Minerals Management Service and replace it with two bureaus and a revenue collection office. The name Minerals Management Service would no longer exist, a spokeswoman said.

Members of Congress and President Barack Obama have criticized what they call the cozy relationship between regulators and oil companies and have vowed to reform MMS, which both regulates the industry and collects billions in royalties from it.

Under the latest plan — the second proposed restructuring of the drilling agency since the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico last month — the agency's three main functions would be split up to avoid what Salazar called a "real or perceived" conflict of interests.

The Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement would inspect oil rigs and enforce safety regulations. The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management would oversee leasing and development of offshore drilling. And the Office of Natural Resources Revenue would collect billions of dollars in royalties for onshore and offshore drilling.

"These three missions — energy development, enforcement and revenue collection — are conflicting missions and must be separated," Salazar said at a news conference.

Employees of the minerals agency "deserve an organizational structure that fits the mission that they are asked to carry out," Salazar said. Under the proposed restructuring, employees would get greater clarity for their roles and responsibilities, strengthening oversight of companies that develop oil, natural gas and other resources, he said.

The enforcement and energy bureaus would report to an assistant Interior secretary for land and minerals management, while the revenue office would report to a policy, management and budget official, Salazar said.

It was not clear how much of the proposed restructuring would need congressional approval. Salazar and other officials said the administration would work with Congress to complete the reforms.

Former Interior Secretary James Watt created the Minerals Management Service by secretarial order in 1982, consolidating several functions that had been performed by the U.S. Geological Survey, the Bureau of Land Management and the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

Salazar said it was important for Congress to set the direction for the minerals agency, the way it has with other Interior agencies such as the Fish and Wildlife Service and National Park Service.

"This is an agency that has a responsibility of protecting American taxpayers and generates $13 billion a year in revenue pay day loan lenders. And it also has the responsibility of protecting the resources of the Outer Continental Shelf. It needs to be a much more robust organization," Salazar said.

The 1,700-employee agency collects and distributes more than $13 billion per year in revenues from federal leases for offshore and onshore drilling. It also sells leases for drilling operations and enforces laws and regulations that apply to drilling.

Critics have long said the agency's roles conflict, leading to accusations of being too cozy with the oil and natural gas industry. There is growing bipartisan sentiment in Congress in favor of toughening oversight of MMS. At a minimum, lawmakers want to ensure the agency's director is a Senate-confirmed position.

The current director, Elizabeth Birnbaum, was appointed by President Barack Obama but did not require Senate confirmation. She did not attend Salazar's news conference Wednesday or a similar event last week when he proposed splitting the minerals agency in two.

Still, Salazar expressed confidence in Birnbaum, saying she has "brought in a fresh perspective" to the director's job. Unlike many of her predecessors she did not work in the oil and gas industry before joining the government.

Rep. Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, called Salazar's proposal "a bold initiative to shake up a badly troubled agency by separating its three basic missions."

Rahall said he wanted to know more details and would examine the proposal more closely when Salazar appears before his committee on May 26.

While just 28-year-old, the minerals agency has long been plagued by charges of corruption and conflict of interest.

An internal investigation in 2008 described a "culture of substance abuse and promiscuity" by agency workers. The investigation by Interior's inspector general found workers at the MMS royalty collection office in Denver partied, had sex with and used drugs with energy company representatives. Workers also accepted gifts, ski trips and golf outings, the report by Inspector General Earl E. Devaney said.

Devaney decried "a culture of ethical failure" and an agency rife with conflicts of interest.

More than half a dozen workers out of around 50 at the Denver office were disciplined — and several were fired — because of the scandal.

Salazar said the reforms announced Wednesday continue a series of changes intended to clean up the agency and strengthen its ethics.

Salazar: Abolish energy agency, divide in 3 parts

Spreadtrum posts 1Q profit as revenue surges

NEW YORK – China's Spreadtrum Communications Inc., which makes chips for wireless phones, posted a first-quarter profit Monday, reversing a loss a year earlier as revenue grew more than six-fold.

The company earned $6.6 million, or 13 cents per American Depositary share, compared with a loss of $8.3 million, or 19 cents per share, in the same period a year earlier.

Adjusted earnings were $8.7 million, or 17 cents per share, in the latest quarter.

Revenue jumped to $52.1 million, surpassing the company's forecast of $40 million to $43 million. Year-ago revenue was $8 faxless cash advance.2 million.

The company said improvements to product quality and customer service helped it gain market share during the quarter.

For the second quarter, Spreadtrum is forecasting revenue of $65 million to $68 million.

The company's American Depositary shares rose $1.35, or 16.5 percent, to $9.53 in after-hours trading after closing down 10 cents at $8.18. The stock hit a 52-week high of $8.47 earlier in the day.

Spreadtrum posts 1Q profit as revenue surges

Goldman to look at suitability of complex products

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Goldman Sachs Group Inc. unveiled details late Friday of a new Business Standards Committee that the firm has set up to bolster the investment bank's client focus and increase the transparency of its activities.

The new committee will review Goldman's business standards then make recommendations to the firm's board of directors and senior management.

One area of focus will be on the suitability of some types of complex structure products for different Goldman clients.

Goldman races to save Chicago bank

John McKinnon discusses how Goldman Sachs has jumped into an effort to save a Chicago bank whose efforts to expand lending in poor communities have high-profile supporters in Washington and Chicago.

The committee will be headed by Gerald Corrigan, chairman of Goldman Sachs Bank USA, and Michael Evans, vice chairman of Goldman Sachs and chairman of Goldman Sachs Asia.

"We recognize that there is a disconnect between how we view the firm and how the broader public perceives our roles and activities," Goldman Chief Executive Lloyd Blankfein said in a statement on Friday. "This initiative is consistent with our obligation to ensure that our standards across our business activities are of the highest quality and represent the benchmark for our industry globally fast payday loan."

The Securities and Exchange Commission filed a civil fraud charge against Goldman last month, alleging that the firm didn't tell investors in a structured product known as a collateralized debt obligation that hedge fund firm Paulson & Co. helped put the deal together and was betting against it. Goldman has said it did nothing wrong, while Paulson wasn't charged.

In the wake of the suit, Goldman executives and top mortgage traders were hauled in front of a Congressional committee where they were criticized for client conflicts of interest.

The Department of Justice has launched a criminal probe into Goldman's activities in the mortgage-bond market and this investigation has broadened to include other Wall Street firms J.P. Morgan Chase , Citigroup , Deutsche Bank , UBS AG and Morgan Stanley , according to the Wall Street Journal.

Goldman to look at suitability of complex products

Duke Energy gets $204M in stimulus funding

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – Duke Energy has signed the agreement to formalize the $204 million in economic stimulus funds it will receive from the federal government, the power provider said Thursday.

Duke said it will use the funds from the Department of Energy to modernize its power distribution system and install digital equipment on the transmission system in the Carolinas. It said the funding will save or create about 1,000 jobs in Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky, and the Carolinas unsecured personal loans.

The grant is part of $3.4 billion in government support for 100 projects announced in October.

Duke Energy Corp. is one of the nation's largest power generators with 4 million customers in the Carolinas and the Midwest.

Duke Energy gets $204M in stimulus funding

Kan. gov. to sign sales tax increase this month

TOPEKA, Kan. – Gov. Mark Parkinson said Tuesday that he will sign by the end of the month the increase in the state sales tax that the Legislature approved to protect public schools and government services from cuts.

The measure boosts the sales tax from 5.3 percent to 6.3 percent, meaning consumers will pay more for groceries and other items beginning July 1, the start of the state's fiscal year.

Increasing the sales tax balances a $13.7 billion budget. The spending plan for the next fiscal year, also approved by bipartisan majorities, protects aid to public schools and government programs from cuts — a key goal for the Democratic governor.

"State government helps the 6-year-old who's in the first grade," Parkinson told House Democrats during an afternoon caucus meeting. "Her schools are going down. You saved them last night."

Parkinson had pushed for higher taxes and had told the Republican-controlled Legislature that he wouldn't accept significant budget cuts after multiple rounds last year.

The tax bill, which is expected to raise $314 million during the next fiscal year, finally was approved by the House early Tuesday, 64-61. Members kept voting open for more than four hours, as a few votes switched back and forth, making the outcome uncertain. The Senate already had passed the measure.

With that settled, legislators wrapped up their business Tuesday, their 89th day in session, one short of what their leaders had scheduled.

Parkinson noted that Kansas' sales tax will remain at 6.3 percent through June 2013, then drop to 5.7 percent, with some of the remaining revenues diverted to highway projects.

Democrats and moderate Republicans in both chambers had agreed with Parkinson that additional reductions would be crippling. They drafted both the proposed budget and the bill raising the sales tax. But conservative Republicans argued that raising taxes wasn't necessary, would hurt working families and would keep the state's economy in a recession longer.

House GOP leaders, conservatives who opposed raising taxes, said the potential damage to schools and government programs was greatly overstated by supporters of a tax increase cheap credit report.

"I think we're taxed enough," said Rep. Joe Patton, a Topeka Republican. "In this debate, the taxpayer has become the forgotten person."

The closeness of the House reflected some Republicans' struggle with raising taxes.

"The moderate Republicans that voted for the budget and the revenue package did the state an enormous favor," Parkinson said.

The tax bill initially appeared to be failing Monday night, but supporters forced the House to keep the voting open and wait for missing members to return. That gave the bill's backers a chance to work on colleagues by phone.

The tally shifted to 63-61 in favor, with only Rep. Virgil Peck absent. Peck, a Tyro Republican who opposed the bill, was at home, 150 miles away, attending to business and personal matters.

Opponents of the tax hike then forced the voting to remain open in hopes of switching votes back.

Peck, who said he'd been told by other Republicans that supporters of a tax increase had more than enough votes and he wouldn't be needed, sped back to Topeka.

He voted "no," but vote switching continued. The last to switch — to "yes" — was Rep. Bill Otto, a LeRoy Republican, who said had wanted other choices, such as raising income taxes or even expanding legalized gambling.

"I just saw no end game," he said later Tuesday, explaining his switch. "I didn't like it."

On Monday, House Republican leaders backed off a plan that would have reduced aid to public schools in favor of one that would have raised the necessary money by selling unused state buildings, land and other property.

"We tried to be responsible but were ignored," said Rep. Peggy Mast, an Emporia Republican.

___

Sales tax increase is Senate Sub for HB 2360. Proposed budget is House Sub for SB 572.

___

On the Net:

Kansas Legislature: http://www.kslegislature.org

Kansas governor: http://www.governor.ks.gov

Kan. gov. to sign sales tax increase this month

E.U. Details $957 Billion Rescue Package

BRUSSELS — European leaders, pressured by sliding markets and doubts over their ability to act decisively, agreed on Monday to provide a huge rescue package of nearly $1 trillion in a sweeping effort to combat the debt crisis that has engulfed Europe and threatened markets around the world.

In an extraordinary session that lasted into the early morning hours, finance ministers from the European Union agreed on a deal that would provide $560 billion in new loans and $76 billion under an existing lending program. Elena Salgado, the Spanish finance minister, who announced the deal, also said the International Monetary Fund was prepared to give up to $321 billion separately.

Officials are hoping the size of the program — a total of $957 billion — will signal a “shock and awe” commitment that will be viewed in the same vein as the $700 billion package the United States government provided to help its own ailing financial institutions in 2008. The package represented an audacious step for a union that had been criticized for acting tentatively, and without consensus, in the face of a mounting crisis.

Underscoring the urgency of the situation, President Obama spoke to the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, and the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, on Sunday about the need for decisive action to restore investor confidence. And in a sign of the spreading anxiety, the United States Federal Reserve, along with the European Central Bank and the central banks of Canada, Britain and Switzerland, announced the re-establishment of instruments known as swap lines through January 2011. The swaps are intended to help ease pressure on the euro, whose value against the dollar has fallen as fearful investors have bought up dollars.

Stock markets in the Asia-Pacific region rose early on Monday. The leading stock indexes in Japan and South Korea were both up about 1.3 percent soon after the deal was confirmed, recouping some of the losses they had suffered last week. The markets in Singapore and mainland China also opened higher, with the market gauges there up 0.5 percent soon after the open.

New political complications in two of Europe’s most important countries added to the challenge. In Germany, voter anger at the effort to save Greece cost Ms. Merkel an important regional election Sunday, undermining her leadership, and in Britain, the government remained in a state of suspended animation because of the inconclusive Parliamentary elections last week. [Pages A4 and A8.]

The package comes at a time of mounting financial unease. Riots in Greece, ever-tightening terms of credit and the unexplained free fall in the American stock market last Thursday have compounded the sense that the European Union’s inability to address its sovereign debt crisis might lead to the type of systemic collapse that followed the fall of Lehman Brothers.

Olli Rehn, the European commissioner for monetary policy, described the arrangement as “a consolidation pact” that would be “particularly crucial for countries under speculative attacks in recent weeks.” He specifically mentioned Portugal and Spain.

Mr. Rehn said the I.M.F. would provide “half as much as the European Union” following lengthy talks with fund officials.

“We shall defend the euro whatever it takes,” Mr. Rehn said.

What appeared to be emerging from the discussions represented a partial retreat from a system discussed earlier in the day that would have radically expanded the powers of the European Commission to raise funds.

Instead the ministers came up with a system that would speed up the pace at which states that use the euro currency could lend to one another, but on a bilateral and voluntary basis.

One of the crucial decisions that ministers made was to create what they called a “special purpose vehicle” to disburse the 440 billion euros in new loans, should that support be required by member states in economic difficulties.

The use of such a financial instrument reflected the difficulties that individual European governments — and Germany’s in particular — have in committing huge sums to a central authority like the European Commission to oversee the economic management of the bloc, seen as a clash with national sovereignty free credit report online.

In a statement following their meeting, the ministers underlined that the special purpose vehicle would expire after three years and that its use would be strictly dependent on “national constitutional requirements.”

Ministers said their first line of defense against financial turmoil was to offer loans of 60 billion euros to member states in need, and to use the further loans of up to 440 billion euros as a “complement” as required.

While the sums being discussed are eye-catching, some bankers questioned whether they would be enough to calm the markets. One banker said that with more and more European economies coping with rising deficits that raising, guaranteeing or backing such a large number would not be an easy task — unless the European Central Bank stepped in in a more forceful and specific manner. The bank has so far rebuffed calls to inject liquidity into the markets by buying back European bonds.

There were many complications in trying to forge a consensus on a new package. They included defining the role of Britain, which lies outside the euro zone and had said it would not help in propping up the euro, as well as the European Central Bank. The fractiousness underscores the frailty of a monetary union in which its richest member, Germany, is also the most opposed to a financial rescue.

“The fact that they are worried is clear,” said David Marsh, the author of “The Euro,” a book on the history of monetary union. “But I don’t think that there is enough commitment or economic firepower in Germany to provide the massive loan guarantees to satisfy the markets.”

Predictably, politicians blamed speculators for the market upheaval. The Swedish finance minister, Anders Borg, said immediate action was needed to tackle “herd behaviors in the markets that are really pack behaviors, wolf pack behaviors.” Mr. Borg warned that volatility in markets could “tear the weaker countries apart.”

Since it became clear that Greece would not be able to meet its financial obligations and fears spread that other indebted nations like Spain, Portugal and Ireland would have similar troubles, Europe, hampered by Germany’s opposition to a bailout, has responded with measures that have been seen as too little too late.

Even now, despite the lashing rhetoric and the Sunday night meeting, there is still a feeling that Europe should be doing more — notably with regard to freeing the European Central Bank to go against its charter and print money by buying back distressed European bonds from the secondary market.

Sunday’s meetings represented an extraordinary convergence of diplomatic activity, crammed into a tight time frame. Political leaders including Mr. Sarkozy of France said early Saturday morning, at the end of an earlier summit meeting, that a loan mechanism intended to restore confidence should be ready by Monday morning. That effectively left the European Commission and finance ministers a single weekend to change the way the European Union operates its finances.

Ms. Merkel of Germany attended a victory parade on Red Square in Moscow on Sunday, a sign of how seriously Germans consider reconciliation with Russia. Mr. Sarkozy and the Italian prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, opted not to attend, regarding the financial crisis as more urgent.

Mr. Sarkozy held a strategy meeting with ministers on Sunday.

“At stake is the euro and the euro zone,” a French official said. “We need to give a clear signal to markets.”

Sewell Chan contributed reporting from Washington. Bettina Wassener contributed reporting from Hong Kong.

E.U. Details $957 Billion Rescue Package

BP brings in the big box to deal with oil disaster

ON THE GULF OF MEXICO – Workers gathered to begin lowering a giant concrete-and-steel box over the blown-out oil well at the bottom of the sea Thursday in a risky and untested bid to capture most of the gushing crude and avert a wider environmental disaster.

"We haven't done this before. It's very complex and we can't guarantee it," BP spokesman David Nicholas warned.

The 100-ton containment vessel is designed to collect as much as 85 percent of the oil spewing into the Gulf and funnel it up to a tanker. It could take several hours to lower it into place by crane, after which a steel pipe will be installed between the top of the box and the tanker. The whole structure could be operating by Sunday.

The technology has been used a few times in shallow waters, but never at such extreme depths — 5,000 feet down, where the water pressure is enough to crush a submarine.

The box — which looks a lot like a peaked, 40-foot-high outhouse, especially on the inside, with its rough timber framing — must be accurately positioned over the well, or it could damage the leaking pipe and make the problem worse.

Other risks include ice clogs in the pipes — a problem that crews will try to prevent by continuously pumping in warm water and methanol — and the danger of explosion when separating the mix of oil, gas and water that is brought to the surface.

"I'm worried about every part, as you can imagine," said David Clarkson, BP vice president of engineering projects.

If the box works, a second one now being built may be used to deal with a second, smaller leak from the sea floor.

"Hopefully, it will work better than they expect," first mate Douglas Peake told The Associated Press aboard the ship that brought the box to the site. The AP is the only news organization on board the vessel.

The well blew open on April 20 when the Deepwater Horizon drilling platform exploded 50 miles out in the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11 workers. The well has been spewing an estimated 200,000 gallons a day in the nation's biggest oil spill since the Exxon Valdez disaster in Alaska in 1989.

Oil slicks stretched for miles off the Louisiana coast, where desperate efforts were under way to skim, corral and set the petroleum ablaze. People in Mississippi, Alabama and Florida watched in despair.

The dropping of the box is just one of many strategies being pursued to stave off a widespread environmental disaster quick payday loans. BP is drilling sideways into the blown-out well in hopes of plugging it from the bottom. Also, oil company engineers are examining whether the leak could be shut off by sealing it from the top instead.

The technique, called a "top kill," would use a tube to shoot mud and concrete directly into the well's blowout preventer, BP spokesman Bill Salvin said. The process would take two to three weeks, compared with the two to three months needed to drill a relief well.

On Thursday, oil reached several barrier islands off the Louisiana coast, many of them fragile animal habitats. Several birds were spotted diving into the oily, pinkish-brown water, and dead jellyfish washed up on the uninhabited islands.

"It's all over the place. We hope to get it cleaned up before it moves up the west side of the river," said Dustin Chauvin, a 20-year-old shrimp boat captain from Terrebonne Parish, La. "That's our whole fishing ground. That's our livelihood."

During a visit to Biloxi, Miss., Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said of the containment vessel: "I hope it works. But we are still proceeding as if it won't. If it does, of course, that will be a major positive development."

"We are facing an evolving situation," she warned. "The possibility remains that the BP oil spill could turn into an unprecedented environmental disaster. The possibility remains that it will be somewhat less."

Meanwhile, a six-member board composed of representatives of the Coast Guard and the federal Minerals Management Service will begin investigating the accident next week.

And a federal judicial panel in Washington has been asked to consolidate at least 65 potential class-action lawsuits claiming economic damage from the spill. Commercial fishermen, business and resort owners, charter boat captains, even would-be vacationers have sued from Texas to Florida, seeking damages that could reach into the billions.

"It's just going to kill us. It's going to destroy us," said Dodie Vegas, who owns a motel and cabins in Grand Isle, La., and has seen 10 guests cancel.

___

Associated Press writers Ray Henry, Cain Burdeau, Holbrook Mohr and Vicki Smith in Louisiana, Brian Skoloff in Mississippi and Curt Anderson in Miami contributed to this story.

BP brings in the big box to deal with oil disaster

Prudential Delays Its Share Sale

LONDON — Prudential Plc., the British insurer aiming to buy the Asian life insurance business of American International Group, postponed the start of its rights issue Wednesday because Britain’s financial regulator needs more time to test the capital ratios of the combined group.

Prudential said it still expects to stick to the original timing of the record $21 billion issue, which it plans to complete in the third quarter. The insurer needs to raise funds to finance the $35.5 billion takeover of the AIA Group, which would be the biggest transaction ever for the 162-year-old company. Prudential shares fell 1.3 percent in London on Wednesday.

Prudential had intended to publish the prospectus of the issue and meet with investors Wednesday ahead of a shareholder vote on the share sale this month. But it said it was delaying the release until it could resolve talks with the Financial Services Authority, the British financial regulator, about the combined company’s capital position. It also postponed releasing its quarterly report until the conclusion of the discussions.

“Up until 7 o’clock this morning, people were expecting the rights news to hit the market,” said Paul Mumford, a fund manager at Cavendish Asset Management, which holds about £2.5 million, or $3.8 million, in Prudential shares.

“Clearly there’s some sort of formula that needs to be satisfied,” Mr. Mumford added.

Prudential said that the talks revolved around the “capital position” of the combined company under an E.U. rule requiring a certain solvency ratio for insurance companies, and preventing them from using the same capital “more than once to cover separate solvency margin requirements.”

The F.S.A. called the company Tuesday evening to say that there are still some unanswered questions with regards to the capital strength of the combined group and that it needs to run some more stress tests, said two people with direct knowledge of the conversation, who declined to be named before the rights issue is completed. Prudential remains in discussion with the F.S.A. and might publish the prospectus next week, they said.

The delay followed days of turmoil in European equity and debt markets because of concern about Greek sovereign debt and whether the crisis could spread to other European economies cash advance payday loan. It also came a day before a general election in Britain, whose outcome could affect the future of the F.S.A., which has admitted to failures leading up to the global financial crisis. The Conservative party, which has been leading in the polls, plans to move most of the F.S.A.’s responsibilities to the Bank of England. An F.S.A. spokeswoman declined to comment on Prudential’s announcement Wednesday.

Last month, Prudential applied for a dual primary listing in Hong Kong, which was set to occur May 11 alongside an additional listing in Singapore. The combined group would get about 60 percent of its business from Asia but agreed to be still regulated in Britain.

“We are entirely committed to the transaction and remain on track to complete within the timing set out on 1 March,” Hugh McGrath, chairman for Prudential, said in a statement.

As it moves to merge with its largest competitor in Asia, Prudential is in the process of securing the approval of multiple regulatory agencies. Reuters reported that the company had won the support of the South Korean trade authority last week, citing unidentified sources in the agency.

The talks with the F.S.A. are not the only complications that have arisen from Prudential’s plan. The Financial Times and other publications have reported that A.I.A. employees, wary of integration with a corporation that was for years a bitter rival and fearing job losses, have been leaving the company.

“The whole thing’s very unusual,” Mr. Mumford said. “It underlines the criticisms people have been making: that it’s rather large to digest and relatively expensive.”

A.I.G. has been selling off units piecemeal in an attempt to pay off at least part of the $182 billion it received in bailout funds from the U.S. government. It was considering an initial public offering for A.I.A. before agreeing to the deal with Prudential.

A.I.G. did not have any immediate comment Wednesday.

Prudential Delays Its Share Sale

Volcanic ash forces Irish airspace closure

DUBLIN, Ireland – Ireland's Aviation Authority says it's banning all flights in and out of Ireland on Tuesday because of a renewed risk of volcanic ash drifting south from Iceland.

The authority says all flights in and out of Irish airports will be banned from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. local time Tuesday (0600GMT to 1200GMT; 2 a.m to 8 a.m EDT), the authority said.

It says in a statement the decision is based on the safety risk as a result of the southward drift of the volcanic ash cloud.

The authority says the restrictions do not affect planes flying over Ireland from Britain and Europe.

Iceland's Meteorological Office says a change of wind direction in the past few days has meant the ash cloud was blowing south and southeast toward Europe, rather than northward.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

DUBLIN, Ireland (AP) — Ireland's Aviation Authority says it may impose a no-fly zone over the country Tuesday because of concerns about the southward drift of volcanic ash from Iceland personal business card.

The authority says northeasterly winds are causing the ash cloud, originating from southern Iceland, to drift south to Ireland. It has informed Irish-based airlines it may be forced to restrict flights.

It said the potential restrictions could affect Dublin and other regional airports, but British airports including Heathrow in London will not be impacted. It said it expected to make a decision at 8 p.m. (1900 GMT, 3 p.m. EDT) Monday.

Iceland's Meteorological Office said a change of wind direction in the past few days meant that the ash cloud was blowing south and southeast toward Europe, rather than northward over Iceland.

Volcanic ash forces Irish airspace closure

Dollar falls vs euro, emerging market currencies

NEW YORK – The dollar traded mixed Friday as markets awaited approval of a bailout package for Greece, while the U.S. economy grew for the third consecutive quarter in the first three months of the year.

Developments in Europe helped boost the euro, while the report of 3.2 percent growth in the U.S. economy weighed on the dollar versus most emerging-market currencies.

In late New York trading, the euro rose to $1.3308 from $1.3245 late Thursday. It fell to a one-year low of $1.3116 Wednesday as debt fears spread throughout Europe, but hopes for quick approval of an expanded, three-year bailout package have helped support the euro since then.

The British pound fell to $1.5277 from $1.5333, while the dollar slipped to 93.93 Japanese yen from 94.02 yen.

The dollar rose to 1.0170 Canadian dollars from 1.0061 Canadian dollars, but slipped to 1.0765 Swiss francs from 1.0832 francs. The dollar also fell versus the Australian and New Zealand dollars, the Nordic currencies and most Asian currencies.

The Commerce Department said on Friday that the U.S. economy grew 3.2 percent in the first three months of the year, down from 5.6 percent in the fourth quarter of 2009. But it was the third consecutive quarter of growth as the U.S. economy recovers from a deep recession.

Consumers and businesses spent more, a welcome sign for the recovery free credit report online.

The solid reading on economic growth mostly weighed on the dollar, which is seen as a haven during economic turmoil as it did during the financial crisis in the aftermath of Lehman Brothers' collapse. Currencies of fast-growing countries in Asia and high-yielding currencies of commodity exporters such as Australia and Brazil gained.

Announcements of budget cuts and tax increases from Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou boosted the euro. Greece, the International Monetary Fund and European leaders are hammering out a financial rescue that could send Greece a reported 120 billion euros over three years and 45 billion euros in loans this year.

Greece's massive deficit and possible default have touched off fears of debt woes in other European countries, helping drag the euro lower from above $1.51 in November.

Although a bailout package could help calm market fears, there's still uncertainty about debt in Europe, said Michael Woolfolk, senior currency strategist at the Bank of New York Mellon. He maintained his euro forecast for $1.28 by the end of the year.

Dollar falls vs euro, emerging market currencies