World business
After months of prodding from activist investor Carl Icahn, eBay decided to spin off PayPal, its online-payments business, which it bought in 2002 for $1.4 billion. It is thought to have a stock market value of around $31 billion and the split, to be completed by the end of 2015, will be one of the biggest in recent years. PayPal was a pioneer in online payments but faces significant competition.
News Corporation made its biggest acquisition since being split from the film and television parts of Rupert Murdoch's empire, by agreeing to buy Move, an online property-listings firm, for $950 million. News Corp's print and digital titles will promote the new service. "Real estate and the fourth estate are a powerful combination," according to Robert Thomson, its chief executive.
The European Commission released documents setting out why it started investigating Apple's tax arrangements in Ireland and Fiat's in Luxembourg, describing the incentives as illegal state aid that gives the companies an advantage in their respective markets. In Apple's case the commission is reviewing the deals that the Irish government offered it in 1991 and 2007 to entice it to base subsidiaries in Ireland.
A trader in Tokyo inadvertently entered an order for $617 billion in shares, including 57 percent of the outstanding stock in Toyota. The error was quickly noticed and the order canceled, resulting in no losses, but it had the potential for being the biggest fat-finger trade to date.
EnCana, Canada's biggest natural-gas producer, expanded its business in shale oil by agreeing to buy Athlon, which is based in west Texas, in a deal valued at $7.1 billion.
Lloyds Banking Group sacked eight employees for manipulating the LIBOR benchmark interest rate. The British bank, which has been fined in the scandal, also clawed back $4.9 million from their bonuses.
Political economy
In the biggest test yet for China's new leaders, prodemocracy protests in Hong Kong swelled in number after police had fired tear gas to disperse protesters. Several areas of the city have been occupied by demonstrators, demanding that the Chinese government withdraw plans to impose limits on voters' choice of candidates in Hong Kong's elections, due in 2017. They also want the territory's leader, Leung Chun-ying, to step down.
It emerged that 50 people died in China's far western region of Xinjiang in unrest on Sept. 21 that involved suicide-bombings and the police opening fire on those who were described as "rioters." The authorities have released few details about this latest in a series of deadly incidents triggered by the grievances of Xinjiang's ethnic Uighurs over Chinese rule.
Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai was sworn in as Afghanistan's new president in Kabul as part of a power-sharing deal in which his election rival, Abdullah Abdullah, in effect becomes prime minister. Elsewhere, two bombs killed 15 people while the inauguration was going on.
At least 47 people, most of them hikers, died when Japan's Mount Ontake erupted. Up to 250 walkers are thought to have been in the area when the volcano started to spew ash clouds and cinders. Most managed to make their way down the mountain to safety, but questioned why there had been no warning that it was about to blow.
Authorities in Mexico charged three soldiers with murder for their role in a shootout in June in which 22 people were killed. It was initially claimed that the victims were members of a drug cartel who died in a firefight.
