Reuters - Stocks extended losses on Thursday as tight credit markets and a spate of bleak economic data left investors even more anxious about the economy's health a day before release of the crucial payrolls report.

Reuters - General Electric Co shares fell as much as 10 percent on Thursday, touching a new 5-1/2-year low, as its sale of $15 billion in new stock to investors including Warren Buffett failed to soothe Wall Street worries.

Reuters - Shockwaves from the global credit crisis spread on Thursday, hitting industry and jobs worldwide and putting pressure on the U.S. Congress to finish up a $700 billion bailout of the U.S. financial sector.

AP - CarMax Inc. said Wednesday it is laying off more than 600 employees, or about 4 percent of its total work force, as the auto retailer tries to cut costs due to a decline in car and truck sales.

Reuters - Lobbyists for the $2 trillion hedge fund industry made a last ditch effort on Wednesday to convince U.S. securities regulators to let an emergency order prohibiting short selling in more than 950 financial firms expire on Thursday.

Reuters - Major automakers reported plunging U.S. sales for September -- led by a 34 percent slide at Ford Motor Co -- as an escalating credit crisis hit the slumping industry and raised new doubts about when the world's largest auto market would stabilize.

Reuters - General Electric Co plans to raise $15 billion through stock sales -- including $3 billion from Warren Buffett -- to improve liquidity and give it the option of more acquisitions at a time of intense market turmoil, the U.S. conglomerate said on Wednesday.

Reuters - U.S. securities regulators on Wednesday extended an emergency ban on short selling in more than 950 financial stocks to give Congress time to finish legislation to rescue the financial system.

Reuters - The U.S. Senate endorsed a revised $700 billion plan to tackle a financial crisis that has shaken world markets and drawn warnings of approaching economic catastrophe.

Reuters - Federal Reserve officials are weighing further interest rate cuts, even if Congress approves a $700 billion financial industry bailout, because of a worsening economic outlook, the Wall Street Journal said on Thursday. A rate cut is still far from certain, partly because of inflation worries, the WSJ said in an unsourced report on its website.

Reuters - Oil fell on Wednesday as U.S. government data showed supplies rising and global markets awaited a U.S. Senate vote on the financial sector rescue package.

Reuters - IBM shares tumbled 6 percent on Wednesday, their biggest drop in three years, on concern the world's biggest computer services company's results missed Wall Street targets in the quarter that ended Sept 30.

Reuters - French Economy Minister Christine Lagarde denied on Wednesday that France was planning a 300 billion euro ($424.4 billion) EU bank rescue package.

Reuters - A revised $700 billion U.S. financial bailout plan is significantly more likely to pass Congress, the White House said Wednesday, as European leaders scrambled to agree on their own bank rescue package.