Family Dollar Stores Inc (FDO.N) said certain state attorney generals have notified the company that they will investigate larger rival Dollar General Corp's (DG.N) takeover bid over competitive concerns.

The U.S. economy grew at its fastest pace in 2-1/2 years in the second quarter with all sectors contributing to the jump in output in a bullish signal for the remainder of the year.

Activist investor Starboard Value LP said on Friday it has acquired a "significant" stake in Yahoo Inc YHOO.O and urged the Internet company to explore a merger with AOL Inc AOL.N.

China will more strictly police the expansion of cities to stop the spread of highly developed but sparsely populated cities or districts known as ghost towns, the state-backed Beijing News reported on Friday.

Yemen will destabilise its economy if it delays reforms such as cuts to energy subsidies, the International Monetary Fund said in a report released after the government rolled back some fuel price rises in the face of political unrest.

Lending to euro zone households and companies contracted for the 28th month in a row in August, though at a slower pace, putting a keener spotlight on European Central Bank efforts to get credit flowing again.

Venezuela announced on Friday the "temporary" takeover of two plants belonging to U.S. cleaning products maker Clorox Co which has left the country because of difficult economic conditions.

Bill Gross' abrupt departure from Pimco, the giant bond firm that he co-founded more than four decades ago, was preceded by months of clashes between the star investor and the firm's executive committee that got progressively worse, according to sources familiar with the situation.

U.S. companies are increasingly less optimistic about the business outlook in China, and see growing competition from local rivals who get preferential treatment as a key challenge, a survey showed on Friday.

The safety recall in parts of the United States of millions of vehicles with potentially defective air bags made by Japan's Takata Corp (7312.T) may expand to include General Motors Co (GM.N), according to documents filed this week with U.S. regulators.

China boosted the quotas it gives foreign institutions to invest in domestic securities by the largest amount in the third quarter since the final quarter of 2012 and regulators may also raise the limit on a parallel yuan-denominated program.

Hackers have begun exploiting the newly identified "Shellshock" computer bug, using fast-moving worm viruses to scan for vulnerable systems and then infect them, researchers warned on Thursday.

Apple Inc (AAPL.O) broke its silence on complaints about bending iPhones, hours after withdrawing a glitch-ridden software update as the company struggles to restore momentum to the rollout of its latest phones.

The dollar held near a four-year high against a basket of currencies on Friday, fueled by the biggest yield advantage over the euro in nearly 15 years as the Federal Reserve contemplates hiking interest rates.

District attorneys of San Francisco and Los Angeles have accused ridesharing service Sidecar Inc of violating California business law and threatened an injunction on its service, the Wall Street Journal reported citing a letter sent to Sidecar and reviewed by the paper.

Intel Corp is close to announcing an investment in Chinese-government affiliated mobile chipmakers Spreadtrum Communications and RDA Microelectronics, its latest move to catch up in a smartphone chip industry led by Qualcomm Inc, according to two sources with knowledge of the plan.

BlackBerry Ltd's launch of its square-screened Passport device may have grabbed headlines this week, but it was the tech company's lower-profile roll out of the new Blend feature that appears to be garnering the plaudits.

China's steel consumption dropped this year for the first time since at least 2000 due to slower economic growth, leading to a surplus of iron ore in the country and a more than 40 percent plunge in prices of the steelmaking raw material.

Hedge fund ValueAct Capital said on Thursday it would return to the board of directors of Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc, which is pursuing a hostile takeover offer for Allergan Inc, and that it planned to increase its stake in the company.

In a boost to U.S. weapons makers looking for ways to offset lower domestic military spending, India is expected to choose Sikorsky Aircraft's S-70B Sea Hawk helicopters at a 16-aircraft tender worth over $1 billion.

French oil company Total SA (TOTF.PA) is looking to sell its 17 percent stake in the Gulf of Mexico's Tahiti oil field, which could fetch between $1.5 billion and $2 billion in a deal, according to people familiar with the matter.

European data privacy regulators on Thursday handed Google a package of guidelines to help it bring the way it collects and stores user data in line with EU law after six regulators opened investigations into the internet giant.

Japan's legions of retail foreign-exchange traders, popularly known as Mrs Watanabe, are turning into sellers of yen.

New orders for capital goods by U.S. businesses rebounded in August, pointing to underlying strength in the economy. The economic outlook also got a lift from other data on Thursday showing only a marginal increase in the number of people filing new claims for unemployment benefits last week.

Chrysler Group LLC, a unit of Fiat SpA (FIA.MI), said it will recall about 350,000 vehicles from the 2008 model year because of a condition that may cause the ignition key to get stuck or inadvertently move.

U.S. stocks ended with sharp losses on Thursday, with the S&P 500 suffering its biggest one-day decline since July, as Apple tumbled and the dollar rose to a four-year high.

Apple Inc released a workaround for iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus users who reported a drop in cellular service and the inability to use the fingerprint reading Touch ID after downloading the iOS 8.0.1 mobile operating system.

The euro hit a 22-month low against the dollar on Thursday on the prospect of diverging monetary policy between the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank as rate differentials swing decisively in the greenback's favor.

Airlines in Asia are stepping up jet fuel hedge volumes after oil prices fell below $100 a barrel this month, with some locking in fuel purchases as far out as 2016, suggesting airlines see oil prices bottoming.

Huawei Technologies Co Ltd [HWT.UL], the world's largest telecommunications equipment maker, said it would invest more than $4 billion in fixed broadband technology research and development (R&D) in the next three years.