
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke urged US lawmakers to lift the country's borrowing limit to avoid a potentially disastrous debt default, warning that the economy was still at risk from political gridlock over the deficit.

US consumers prices fell in November due to a sharp drop in petrol prices, according to official figures, as inflation in the economy remained weak. The consumer price index fell 0.3% from October, the first decline since May, the US Labour Department said.

The US Federal Reserve has said it plans to keep interest rates at close to zero at least until the US unemployment rate falls below 6.5%. The Fed previously had a date-driven target, rather than a data-driven one.

Standard Chartered will pay more than 300 million dollars to settle charges it violated US sanctions on Iran, Burma, Libya and Sudan. The UK-based bank has been fined 100m by the Federal Reserve and the Department of Justice seized assets worth 227m, the regulators said.

In its last meeting before the November 6 presidential election, the Federal Reserve confirmed its current fresh-money support program for the recovery of the US economy arguing that growth continues slowly and unemployment rate remains elevated.

Brazil’s central bank president Alexandre Tombini refuted on Monday arguments that the US expansionist monetary policy do not harm emerging countries such as Brazil.

Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke has defended the central bank's measures to bolster the US economy. Brazil has said US monetary easing to keep interest rates low and weaken the dollar has hurt emerging economies. And IMF chief Christine Lagarde warned on Sunday of consequent asset bubbles developing in emerging nations.

The US unemployment rate fell last month to its lowest rate since January 2009, figures from the Department of Labour have shown, surprising analysts who had been expecting a small rise.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke delivered a broad defence on Monday of the central bank's controversial bond-buying stimulus plan, saying its actions are necessary to support a flagging economic recovery.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said on Friday progress in bringing down US unemployment was too slow and the central bank would act as needed to strengthen the economic recovery.