Britain's Financial Services Authority recommended improvements to its oversight of the banking industry after the collapse of Northern Rock, a mortgage lender stricken by the credit crisis and later nationalized. The authority admitted failures in supervising the bank and it promised to recruit extra staff and work more closely with financial institutions.
Two private-equity firms trying to buy Clear Channel, America's biggest radio-station network, filed lawsuits to force Wall Street banks to supply the funding they had arranged for the $19.5 billion deal. It is one of the biggest recent buyouts to face collapse because of credit woes.
Citigroup agreed to pay $1.66 billion to Enron's creditors, settling the last of the "mega claims" brought against 11 banks and brokerages for alleged involvement in the energy trader's collapse.
Motorola said it would split its mobile-phone business from its networking division and that the two would trade as separate companies. Motorola's handsets, such as the RAZR, have lost market share to more sophisticated devices and been a drag on earnings. Investor Carl Icahn pushed Motorola to spin off the division.
The long-awaited sale of Ford's Jaguar and Land Rover to Tata Motors was announced; the Indian company is paying around $2.3 billion for the luxury-car brands. Ford acquired Jaguar in 1989 and Land Rover in 2000, but now is restructuring its business around its more basic models.
BP's joint venture in Russia ran into more bother from the authorities. TNK-BP acknowledged it was having trouble renewing visas for 148 mostly British and American employees. In addition, the interior ministry said it was investigating alleged tax evasion at a former subsidiary of the company.
The proposed merger between XM and Sirius, announced in February 2007, was approved by the Justice Department. This combination of the only two satellite-radio networks in America (with their stable of talk-radio stars) is opposed by other broadcasters. However, the Justice Department reckoned the deal would not create a monopoly because of competition from the Internet.
Political economy Ma Ying-jeou of the Nationalist party, the Kuomintang, won the presidential election in Taiwan by 17 percentage points over his rival, Frank Hsieh of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party. Ma has promised to improve relations with China, starting by opening direct transport links with the mainland.
The French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, declared that France and Britain had never been so close. Addressing both houses of Parliament during a state visit, he called for a new Franco-British brotherhood and insisted that "we need you, the British, within Europe."
Farmers in Argentina blocked roads in an intensifying protest against a rise in export taxes decreed by the government of Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner. After she accused the farmers of "extortion", thousands of pot-banging anti-government demonstrators took to the streets of Buenos Aires.
Brazil's government sent extra doctors and nurses to Rio de Janeiro in response to an outbreak of dengue fever in which about 30,000 people have been taken ill and at least 49 have died.
