Business News: General

The European Commission gave the greenlight on Wednesday to Nokia's purchase of US digital navigation group Navteq after finding the deal would not thwart competition.

The country's largest mortgage company HDFC and the largest private sector bank ICICI Bank today hiked interest rates, making it more expensive for existing as well as new customers to own a house.

The Sri Lankan government has asked LIOC, the Lankan subsidiary of India's oil major Indian Oil Corporation, to reduce diesel prices on par with the country's state-run oil company, unless the government will take action against it.

Credit cards seem like a lot of fun, but the relationship can quickly sour if you're in over your head.

As the alarm over soaring oil prices and losses on Wall Street sent markets tumbling across Asia today - the Bombay Stock Exchange benchmark Sensex tanked over 500 points, at one stage dipping even below 15,000 points before ending the day at 15,066 - Prime Minister Manmohan Singh again pitched for the Indo-US nuclear deal, saying the country does not have the "luxury" of limiting energy options a

Jocelyn Woolsey, Forbes.com
Ominous headlines sell newspapers and magazines, but when it comes to the economy, they don't always capture the truth in the trenches.

Melanie Lindner, Forbes.com
Capital is a constraint for many would-be entrepreneurs--or is it?

Mumbai's realty market, which in recent years witnessed an astronomical price increase bringing it in the league of the world's most expensive cites, is finally taking a beating.

Joshua Lipton, Forbes.com
Energy prices are notoriously volatile, but now they're moving in just one direction: up.

With ministries of Petroleum and Finance bickering over specific steps to provide hard cash to loss-making state-run oil marketing companies, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today directed Petroleum Minister Murli Deora to club all possible options, including a 3 per cent cess on income tax, and bring it to the Cabinet on Thursday for a decision.

John Reese, Validea, Forbes.com
As the chairman of a company that has about $280 billion in total assets--including more than $35 billion in cash--

Blamed for a spike in food prices, its environmental benefits increasing disputed, ethanol production nonetheless is booming in the United States, where factories are multiplying to keep up with demand.

Jim Oberweis, The Oberweis Report, Forbes.com
Market bottoms are like giving birth. The exact moment is hard to predict, but it is always painful. Though it sometimes takes longer than you'd guess, you know it is coming. And once it is over, it sure feels better.

It may not be as glamorous, but the stock market also sees the trends changing as per the season -- just like the fashion industry.

Steel companies, battling government allegations of cartelisation and stoking inflation, today offered to cut prices across the board after a meeting with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

Country's financial capital Mumbai is the worlds' seventh largest city in terms of billionaire population, says Forbes, the American business magazine famous for its annual list of richest people on the globe.

Corporates can undertake affirmative action by recruiting people on the basis of potential and not on merit alone, as part of the Corporate Social Responsibility initiatives, Planning Commission Member Kirit Parikh suggested.

India, now under scrutiny due to rice export curbs and growing consumption that have helped drive grain prices to record highs, could help ease global food security fears, M S Swaminathan, the country's most revered rural economist, said.

Bottlenecks continue to delay the Sipat project with NTPC now having reservations on giving a fresh application to the Chhattisgarh government for restoring water supply to the project.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's appeal to all political parties not to politicise the inflation issue and not to indulge in "scare mongering" had the Left fuming today as it launched an attack on him.