Global business

UBS confirmed that American prosecutors have charged one of its most senior executives with conspiring to help wealthy clients hide assets from the Internal Revenue Service. Raoul Weil is chairman of the Swiss bank's global wealth-management business and a member of the executive board. He stepped down from his duties to fight the case. The allegations form part of a long-running investigation by American authorities into the secretive relationships between Swiss banks and their rich customers.

In a surprise turnaround, U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said that the remaining funds in the government's $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program would best be used to provide capital infusions to distressed companies and tackle consumer debt, rather than buy illiquid mortgage-related assets. The Treasury has already spent $250 billion on bank recapitalizations. Congress approved the package a little over a month ago on the basis that the illiquid assets would be bought.

The Federal Reserve gave American Express the go-ahead to turn itself into a bank. The decision gives America's only remaining big independent credit-card company greater access to government funding.

NRG Energy rejected Exelon's $6.2 billion unsolicited takeover offer partly because of Exelon's "obvious difficulties on both the debt financing and credit-rating front."

Starbucks' quarterly net profit fell by 97 percent compared with the same period a year earlier. Before the economic crisis hit consumers' wallets, the purveyor of coffee was already suffering from overexpansion and is closing many of its ubiquitous stores.

Political economy

China unveiled proposals worth nearly $600 billion to boost its economy. The measures, some of which have already been made public, boost spending in infrastructure, construction, agriculture and welfare.

The World Bank said it would make an additional $100 billion available to developing countries over the next few years. Robert Zoellick, the bank's president, said that "virtually no country has escaped" the financial and economic crisis, but that poorer countries were particularly vulnerable to a slowdown in the global economy and decline in world trade.

America's unemployment rate in October hit a 14-year high of 6.5 percent. Meanwhile, Circuit City, an electronics retailer with 40,000 employees, sought bankruptcy protection. It is the largest American retailer to go bust since the start of the credit crisis.

In Britain the unemployment rate reached an average of 5.8 percent for the three months to September. BT, Britain's biggest telecom company, said it was cutting 10,000 jobs. As the Bank of England delivered another glum outlook on the economy, the pound hit a six-year low of $1.49.

European Union foreign ministers agreed to restart talks on a new partnership agreement with Russia, even though the Russians have not complied with E.U. demands to pull all their troops out of Georgia after the August war. Only the Lithuanians refused to back the E.U.'s about-turn.

Costa Rica's legislature voted to implement the Central America Free Trade Agreement, ratified by other countries in the region and by the United States. Costa Rican voters narrowly approved the pact in a referendum in October 2007.

A senior Chinese official reported that no progress had been made in the latest round of talks with representatives of the Dalai Lama. The official accused Tibet's exiled spiritual leader of continuing to seek "disguised independence" for his homeland.