China ended 100 years of US dominance of the motor industry yesterday when it was officially named the world’s biggest car market, the Daily Mail reports.
Days after it was confirmed as the largest global exporter, China broke an American stranglehold which had started with the development of the Ford Model T.
The figures underline the country’s growing status and power in the world. It is also on track to supplant Japan as the world’s second largest …

Formula 1 tycoon Bernie Ecclestone is part of a bid to take over struggling Swedish car maker Saab, the Independent reports.
The billionaire has teamed up with the Luxembourg-based investment company Genii Capital, which recently invested in Renault’s racing team.
Saab have been put up for sale by owner GM as part of a major restructuring operation, and a bid deadline passed yesterday.
The US car-making giant have been trying to sell Saab since January last year and …

Car maker Ford are to sell their Swedish business, Volvo Cars, to China’s car company Geely, the BBC reports.
Ford said  that while some work still remains to be completed, they anticipate a definitive sale agreement in the first quarter.
Ford put Volvo up for sale a year ago to help pay off their debt and make their business more focused.
Geely were named preferred bidder in November. If completed, Volvo will be the largest purchase by a …

Saab Motors, one of Sweden’s best-known brands, are to be wound down after their parent company General Motors, the US car giant, were unable to find a buyer, The Times reports.
GM said today that they had come to the decision after talks to sell the brand to Dutch car-maker Spyker Cars collapsed. Issues arose during the talks that could not be resolved, the company said.
GM said they will continue to honour Saab customer warranties, but …

Low-cost airline Ryanair pulled out of talks with Boeing over a potential multibillion-dollar order for up to 200 new aircraft, the Independent reports.
The decision will result in a major change in strategy for the airline that have no plans to reopen discussions with other aircraft manufacturers.
While a separate deal for the delivery of 112 Boeing 737s over the next three years will still take place, Ryanair said they will reduce growth and capital expenditure beyond …

The Speaker of the US House of Representatives, Californian Democrat Nancy Pelosi endorsed the idea of a “global” tax on stock trades and other financial transactions, saying the estimated $150 billion in annual revenue from such a tax could be used to help fund more stimulus spending, CNSNews.com reports.
Pelosi said that the financial transactions tax, currently before Congress, would have to be made “global” to keep US investors from taking their business overseas and out …

Shares in London tumbled as the market opened this morning, following steep losses in Asia, as investor panic over banks’ exposure to Dubai’s growing financial problems gathered pace, The Times reports.
The FTSE 100 index of leading UK shares fell by 83.46 points to 5,110.67 in early trading, adding to yesterday’s loss of 170.68 points. The FTSE bounced back, to fall by 12 points to 5,182.13 after more than an hour of trading but all eyes …

The price of gold soared above 1,195 US dollars (£722) an ounce for first time in history today, following a purchase of IMF gold by Sri Lanka’s central bank, AFP reports.
Gold hit 1,195.13 dollars per ounce at around 4:00am GMT on the London Bullion Market, extending its record-breaking run.
The precious metal has won support in recent weeks from inflationary fears, the weak US currency and increasing moves by central banks to diversify assets into gold.
The …

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) say that growth and recovery are expected in 2010 in just about all world regions, the BBC reports.
For the organisation’s 30 member countries, rich nations including the US and UK, they have more than doubled their growth forecast to 1.9% for next year, from 0.7%.
But the OECD warn that developed nations not to expect a smooth ride. They said growth was being “held back by still substantial …

Software producer Microsoft are cutting 800 more jobs in addition to the 5,000 lay-offs they announced in January, the Independent reports.
The cuts are being made in offices around the globe.
Microsoft said that in January they would continue to hire in key areas such as web search.
At the end of September, about 91,000 people worked for Microsoft.

The board of General Motors decided yesterday to scrap the plan to sell the company’s Vauxhall and Opel divisions to Canadian car parts supplier Magna.
GM had agreed to sell Opel and Vauxhall to Magna to raise cash after almost being bankrupted this year, but last night the board of GM met in Detroit, where the carmaker are based, and decided to scrap the plan, The Times reports. It is understood that the American board had become …

Mobile-phone giant Nokia filed suit against Apple yesterday, claiming that the producer of the iPhone have violated 10 of Nokia’s wireless technology patents, MarketWatch reports.
Nokia said that the patents in question “relate to technologies fundamental to making devices” that are compatible with the GSM, UMTS, or 3G WCDMA, and wireless LAN standards. They added that the technologies in the suit cover wireless data, speech coding, security and encryption technologies, and that Apple’s iPhones have infringed …

When the rest of the world is still in deep recession, despite claims by many that it has already ended or is about to end, communist China claims that their economy grew a mighty 8.9 per cent in the third quarter this year, and 7.7 per cent in the first nine months.
China’s state-controlled newspaper China People’s Daily reports that China’s GDP totalled 21.78 trillion yuan (£1.92 trillion) in the first nine months.
The growth rates for …

Oil prices briefly rose above $80 a barrel today in Asia as better-than-expected US corporate earnings boosted investor confidence, FoxNews reports.
Benchmark crude for November delivery rose as much as 44 cents to $80.05 a barrel, but later fell back and was down 27 cents at $79.34 by late afternoon Singapore time in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract rose $1.08 to settle at $79.61 yesterday.
Crude demand has remained sluggish this year …

Apple continued to power through the recession as they posted a 47% quarterly profit jump as consumers continued to snap up their iPhones and Macintosh computers, the Wall Street Journal reports.
The company also sounded an upbeat note for the holiday season, despite new competition in the smart-phone and PC markets. Shares of Apple surged more than 6% after the results were released, eclipsing $200.
Apple sold 7.4 million iPhones in the quarter ended 26th September, up …

Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt said that the worst of the recession is over, as the internet giant posted quarterly profits of £1billion, much thanks to online shopping.
Google have weathered the recession better than other advertising-dependent companies, and they were widely expected to be one of the first beneficiaries of an economic recovery.
“The worst of the recession is clearly behind us,” Google’s chief executive, Eric Schmidt, said. “Because of what we have seen, we now have …