Economy

• Sunday, September 28th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  Spanish bank and UK government ready to take over B & B

  

  Spanish bank Santander is on the brink of taking over the £20bn savings business of troubled bank Bradford & Bingley, the BBC has learned. Treasury officials and bankers are putting the final touches to a deal, says BBC business editor Robert Peston.

• Sunday, September 28th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  Uruguay's trade deficit in 7 months reaches 1.2 b USD

  

  Uruguay reported a trade surplus of 68.3 million US dollars after having accumulated 1.2 billion US dollars deficit in the first seven months of 2008, according to the country's Central Bank.

• Sunday, September 28th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  US Congress agrees to vote Monday bail-out package

  The United States Congress is set to vote on Monday the largest single financial bailout in US history after leaders from both parties nailed down the details of the package, following long days and nights of tense and sometimes tempestuous negotiation.

• Sunday, September 28th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  The impact of transport costs on Latinamerican trade

  

  Latin American exports' growth depends more on lower transport costs than on reduction of tariffs. This warning is in research “Unclogging the Arteries: A Report on the Impact of Transport Costs on Latin American and Caribbean Trade.”

• Saturday, September 27th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  “Sooner or later” global financial crisis will reach Latam

  Ibero-America Secretary General Enrique Iglesias said Latinamerica feels somehow frustrated because it is a “victim, not an actor” of the current global financial crisis, which sooner or later will reach the region.

• Friday, September 26th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  Democrats' message to markets: rescue bill is “back on track”

  United States president George W Bush has said that legislators will “rise to the occasion” and pass the proposed 700 billion Wall Street rescue plan. He said disagreements remained as “the proposal is big and the reason it's big is because it's a big problem”.

• Thursday, September 25th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  Live cattle prices in Uruguay sliding after peaking in August

  

  Live cattle prices in Uruguay after reaching a historic peak in mid August have begun to drop significantly following the meat industry's decision to soften activity and a drop in demand from Russia and to a certain extent the European Union.

• Thursday, September 25th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  EU announces strict rules but no US style banks bail out

  

  Europe does not need a US-style bail-out of banks, but must introduce stricter financial supervision, a top EU official has said. Economy commissioner Joaquin Almunia said mimicking the 700 billion US plan to unfreeze credit markets was unnecessary because the situation was “less acute”.

• Thursday, September 25th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  Financial crisis: Bush appeals to Congress, Obama and McCain

  

  Americans must support a massive bail-out of financial markets to ease a “serious financial crisis”, US President George W Bush said on Wednesday. The entire economy was in danger, he said in a live TV speech, and failure to act now would cost more later.
  
  He has invited presidential rivals John McCain and Barack Obama to the White House on Thursday to discuss the 700 billion US dollars rescue package.
  
  The rivals have disagreed on delaying a TV debate over the economic turmoil.

• Thursday, September 25th 2008 - 21:00 UTC

  Brazil unemployment at its lowest level since 2001: 7.6%

  Brazilian unemployment in August fell to its lowest level since 2001 thanks in part to the nation's solid economic growth. The country's official statistics institute IBGE said the rate dropped to 7.6% from 8.1% in July and 1.9 percentage points from August 2007.