HOUSING GLOOM: A week after the Dow Jones exceeded 14,000 points for the first time ever, fears over subprime mortgages triggered dramatic losses on Wall Street
Wall Street took a pounding over the past week, with blue chips suffering their worst week in more than four years as fears about the housing market and tightening credit sent investors diving for cover.

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SWEETENER: Advanced Medical Optics said it believes its US$4.2 billion offer for the eyecare firm was superior to an offer private equity firm Warburg Pincus had made
Advanced Medical Optics Inc (AMO) tried on Friday to improve its chances of buying Bausch & Lomb Inc by offering two proposals to prove that its own shareholders support the deal.

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The US dollar gained on the euro on Friday as investors turned to the greenback as a safe haven amid fears of a looming global financial credit crunch.

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GLOBAL IMPACT: Some sporadic bargain-hunting in Taipei on Friday was insufficient to prevent a global sell-off from dragging Taiwanese stocks sharply lower
Asian stocks had the biggest weekly drop in a year as US reports heightened concern that a housing slump is spreading in the world's biggest economy. BHP Billiton and Samsung Electronics Co led the slide.

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Conflicts of interest may still be rampant on Wall Street, with a new study showing that nearly two-thirds of investment-firm analysts received favors from executives of companies they cover and suggesting that the companies get favorable ratings in return.

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WTO COMPLAINTS: Boeing said that recent top management changes at Airbus could help pave the way to a negotiated settlement of the two-year-old dispute
Airbus and Boeing, the world's two largest plane makers, said on Friday they were prepared to hold talks on subsidy disputes filed before the WTO more than two years ago.

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Oil prices closed above US$77 a barrel, near an all-time high on Friday on technical buying and news of faster-than-expected economic growth.

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European stocks closed lower on Friday in a volatile session, with credit-market jitters again reverberating through the market as Cadbury Schweppes delayed the sale of its US beverage unit on worries over the financing that potential buyers could receive.

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Asian currencies slumped on Friday, with Indonesia's rupiah tumbling to a four-month low as fund managers shunned emerging-market debt and equity markets.

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The Tibet Autonomous Region vowed to place the protection of its glaciers, wetlands and grasslands ahead of the development of industries such as tourism and manufacturing in its economic planning.

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Ford Motor Co, unwinding a two-decade luxury-car strategy, will provide more detailed financial data to bidders for UK-based Jaguar and Land Rover, the company's finance chief said.

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■ Foodstuffs
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