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British bank Barclays is in talks with Lehman Brothers to buy its core U.S. broker-dealer business, including equity, fixed income, M&A advisory and other parts, people familiar with the matter said.

A deal could save thousands of jobs and many of Lehman’s core investment bank operations, a day after the U.S. bank’s holding company filed for bankruptcy protection.

Barclays said on Tuesday it was in talks to buy some of Lehman’s assets on terms that would need to be attractive to its shareholders. It declined to comment further.

The talks mainly involve the core U.S. business, which has 8,000 to 10,000 staff, but could include some of its global businesses, the sources said.

It does not include Lehman’s asset management and wealth management arms.

The sources said there is an urgency to the talks as a deal would need to be struck before staff and clients leave and damage the franchise.

A deal would include staff, infrastructure, licenses and some of Lehman’s financial positions, but would not leave the UK bank exposed to Lehman’s troubled assets, the sources said.

Barclays was involved in frantic talks over the weekend to rescue Lehman, but quit after U.S credit reports. authorities would not guarantee the U.S. investment bank’s trading obligations. 

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VIENNA, Austria — The just-ended OPEC meeting was about more than what a barrel of oil can fetch on the open market as the global economic picture dims.

OPEC heavyweight Saudi Arabia gave a nod, at least symbolically, to fellow member states that have grown increasingly uneasy about the rapid decline in crude prices. The Saudis attempted to placate rival Iran, and laid the groundwork for a potential new alliance with Russia, the world’s second-largest oil producer.

But OPEC’s announcement that it would cut output by more than 500,000 barrels by sticking closer to quotas did little to change what most consumers care most about — the cost of filling up a car with gas or heating a home over the winter.

Benchmark oil prices were on a downward course Wednesday, shedding 68 cents to fetch $102.58 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Brent crude briefly touched $98.10.

Behind the scenes, the 13-nation energy cartel juggled the conflicting interests of Saudi Arabia and Iran — and brought oil and gas giant Russia closer into the fold by agreeing to sign a cooperation agreement with the Kremlin.

OPEC’s continued ability to present a common front, while extending a hand to Russia, is potentially bad news for major crude consumers including the United States and Europe. There may be even less wiggle room in trying to find the lowest bidder to meet their energy needs at a time when the summer’s record oil prices close to $150 are a still vivid memory.

But it also may have signaled that record oil prices have spoiled the global appetite for crude, at least for the near future easy payday loans.

"The ministers appear genuinely concerned that the bottom is falling out of global demand and that once-depleted stocks are rebounding with a vengeance," said Antoine Halff, an energy analyst with Newedge USA. "Their panic is testament to how soft the market has become. It is likely to grow even softer."

Saudi Arabia’s clout is key for Washington. President George W. Bush visited Riyadh twice this year to push an oil production increase. The Saudis answered by ramping up production by about 500,000 barrels a day.

OPEC’s decision Wednesday to cut output by 520,000 barrels effectively canceled even that relatively modest nod to U.S. requests, leaving some talking about a Saudi defeat and a victory for Iran, which has sought higher oil prices through production cuts.

Not so, said analyst and trader Stephen Schork, who was monitoring the meeting in Vienna.

"I wouldn’t say the Saudis backed down," he said. "I’d say it was a respectful nod to the other members of the group."

In reality, the Saudis are the tail that wags the dog at OPEC, accounting for nearly a third of the group’s production of around 30 million barrels a day. They often get their way at OPEC ministerial meetings, and a strong push by them in Vienna to keep the status quo on output probably would have succeeded.

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Tsingtao Brewing Co., one of China’s largest brewers, agreed that the 27 percent stake in the company that is currently held by Anheuser-Busch Cos. will transfer to InBev of Belgium when InBev finalizes its proposed takeover of Anheuser-Busch. A short notice about the agreement was filed today with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

InBev hopes to take over St. Louis-based Anheuser-Busch by the end of the year in a $52 billion buyout. The Tsingtao deal would give the combined company — Anheuser-Busch InBev — control of roughly one-fifth of the Chinese beer market, the world’s largest.

Anheuser-Busch said it first invested in China in 1993, when the company acquired a minority stake in Tsingtao cash advance in one hour. In October 2002, Anheuser-Busch and Tsingtao formed a strategic alliance to share best practices in areas such as production technology, marketing, sales and management. In 2005, Anheuser-Busch increased its investment in Tsingtao to 27 percent.

jmcwilliams@post-dispatch.com | 314-340-8372

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A federal judge has ruled that Oracle Corp. destroyed or failed to preserve chief executive Larry Ellison's e-mail files sought as evidence in a class-action lawsuit filed in 2001 against the software maker, according to reports.

The suit seeks damages on behalf of Redwood City-based Oracle (NASDAQ:ORCL) shareholders who held the stock when it fell after the company reported disappointing results in 2001.

The lawsuit claims Ellison and other Oracle executives made false statements about the company's financial condition as well as the functionality of its Oracle 11i suite of business management software, according to the reports.

U.S. District Judge Susan Illston also ruled that Oracle improperly failed to produce tapes and transcripts from interviews that a journalist conducted with Ellison in 2001 and 2002 as he gathered material to write "Softwar," a biography of the company's founder.

She said the tapes and transcripts were held by the author, Matthew Symonds, who had them destroyed in late 2006 or early 2007.

Illston said Oracle should have figured out a way to comply with the order to produce the information, which was issued in late 2006, saying that Ellison knew of the litigation at the time most of the interviews were conducted pay day loans. She said that he shared intellectual property rights to the materials with Symonds.

"It is appropriate to infer that the emails and software materials would demonstrate Ellison's knowledge of, among other things, problems with Suite 11i, the effects of the economy on Oracle's business and problems with defendants' forecasting model," Illston said in an order released on Tuesday.

Illston said she would instruct jurors to make such an inference when they consider the case during a trial scheduled to begin on March 30.

Oracle has asked the court to throw out the case prior to the start of the trial.

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Morgan Stanley (MS.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) is raising $10 billion for a global property fund and plans to put $1.5 billion or more of that into China, shrugging off concern about a property market downturn, a banking source said on Wednesday.

The Morgan Stanley Real Estate Fund VII Global, the latest in a series of property investment funds, is expected to begin investing worldwide before the end of this year, said the source, who had direct knowledge of the fund.

It will invest at least 10 billion yuan ($1.46 billion) in China over the next few years, taking a gradual approach while focusing on the largest cities such as Shanghai, where the price for a luxury downtown apartment can exceed $20 million, said the source.

The retail portion of the fund-raising has been completed with a minimum requirement of $1 million for individual investors in Asia.

The institutional portion, which requires at least $10 million for each institutional investor, will be completed soon, the source added.

“It should not be too difficult for Morgan Stanley to raise funds from retail investors in Asia since, as you know, in China alone the number of millionaires has been growing very fast in recent years,” the source said.

“As for the institutional portion, many of them are old friends of Morgan Stanley,” he said, referring to investors in the Wall Street bank’s last six global property funds.

The source declined to be identified because he was not authorized to comment on the fund to the media payday loans. Morgan Stanley declined to comment. 

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Marvel Entertainment Inc is expected to post a 26 percent rise in second-quarter profit on the strength of its licensing business, which is expected to benefit from merchandising related to its successful “Iron Man” movie.

Tuesday’s second-quarter report will be the first quarter after the comic-book publisher started releasing its first self-produced films.

But analysts are really tuned to the third and fourth quarters, when most expect Marvel to reap the rewards from its first movie titles, and will be looking for potential outlook comments.

Marvel is expected to possibly increase its outlook for the year and give more clarity about when revenue from its films will be reflected on its income statement.

“The story really is about the film business cheap payday loans. Everything else is the same old Marvel,” Wedbush Morgan Securities analyst Michael Pachter said.

In April, Marvel entered Hollywood film-making with “Iron Man,” its first self-produced film, that had the second-biggest non-sequel box office opening in history.

“Iron Man,” which was distributed by Viacom Inc’s Paramount Pictures, has made $315.7 million in domestic box office so far, according to Box Office Mojo.

The movie was followed by “The Incredible Hulk,” far-less successful, but still expected to bring in a moderate profit. 

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The U.S. economy needs months to recover from its slowdown, but the banking system remains sound despite a home mortgage crisis that could cause more problems, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said.

Paulson also said on Sunday morning news programs he was optimistic Congress would approve the Bush administration’s request for authority to shore up the troubled mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

The treasury secretary has been trying to reassure nervous financial markets and is scheduled to deliver an important speech on markets and the economy in New York on Tuesday.

“We’re going to be in a period of slow growth for a while,” Paulson told “Face the Nation” on CBS. “I think it’s going to be months that we’re working our way through this period.”

High energy prices would prolong the slowdown, but the key to recovery was stabilizing the housing market, Paulson said.

He added that U.S cashadvance.com. banking problems were manageable despite this month’s highly publicized failure of mortgage lender Indy bank.

The July 11 takeover of the bank by Federal regulators marked the third-largest bank failure in U.S. history. The lines of frustrated depositors outside its doors provided a stark illustration of the U.S. home financing crisis.

“Our banking system is a safe and a sound one,” Paulson insisted on CNN’s “Late Edition.” 

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Marcus Brauchli was named executive editor of The Washington Post on Monday, three months after resigning under pressure from the top newsroom job at The Wall Street Journal.

Brauchli, 47, is to succeed Leonard Downie Jr., who has led the Post for 17 years and will retire Sept. 8 at the age of 66. Brauchli will be in charge of both the Post’s print and online editions.

Brauchli’s appointment is part of a broader leadership change at The Washington Post, which named Katherine Weymouth, 42, publisher in February. Weymouth is a member of the Graham family, which controls The Washington Post Co (WPO).

Weymouth said in a statement that Brauchli’s broad experience would help the newspaper "navigate the new world of media," building on the standards set by Downie and his predecessor, Ben Bradlee.

At the Journal, Brauchli oversaw the integration of the newspaper’s print and online operations. At the Post, both washingtonpost.com executive editor Jim Brady and the newspaper’s managing editor, Phil Bennett, will report to Brauchli. Bennett was seen as a potential candidate for executive editor.

Shortly after announcing his retirement last month, Downie told AP that the Post needed a new, younger editor to lead the paper’s next phase of change as it adapts to the new realities of the journalism business being wrought by the Internet.

Like many other newspapers, The Washington Post is struggling with revenues declining due to the nation’s economic slump and to advertising dollars flowing online. The Post recently went through its third round of job cuts and reported an 11% decline in print advertising revenues for its first quarter.

Online news readership is growing, but revenue from online advertising hasn’t grown nearly enough to replace the losses in revenue from print advertising.

Brauchli (whose name is pronounced BROCK’-lee), became managing editor of The Wall Street Journal in May 2007, shortly after Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp freecreditscore. (NWS, Fortune 500) mounted a bid to acquire the Journal’s parent company, Dow Jones & Co.

Brauchli left that post in April.

A native of Boulder, Colo., Brauchli started his career at Dow Jones in 1984 as a copy reader for its news service and was soon posted to Hong Kong. He later served as Scandinavia correspondent for The Wall Street Journal’s European edition, reported for the Journal from Tokyo and became China bureau chief. He moved to New York in 1999 as a news editor and became national news editor the following year.

Brauchli left the top newsroom job at the Journal just four months after News Corp. closed its acquisition of the paper, saying he had come to believe the paper’s new owners should have an editor of their own choosing.

News Corp. had moved quickly to shake up the Journal shortly after buying it, bringing in more political stories and reorganizing the paper’s layout. It also installed a news executive above Brauchli - Robert Thomson, former editor of The Times of London. Thomson’s title was publisher but he had broad editorial oversight of the Journal and other Dow Jones properties.

Brauchli did not return phone or e-mail messages seeking comment Monday evening.

Downie joined The Washington Post as a summer intern in 1964 and later served as investigative reporter, a metro reporter, London correspondent and national editor. He oversaw the paper’s Watergate coverage as its deputy metro editor.

Downie, who said he will turn his focus to writing projects, will stay on as a vice president at large at The Washington Post Co., a title that Bradlee also holds.

The Washington Post Co. also owns Newsweek magazine and Kaplan Inc., a major education company. 

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OTTAWA – The World Wildlife Fund says Canada should come up with a sound management plan before it issues oil-and-gas exploration rights in the northern Beaufort Sea.

The global conservation group says the federal government should wait until it fully understands the environmental impacts of drilling, and knows how to clean up "inevitable" spills.

Ottawa has offered up the rights to oil-and-gas exploration on nearly three million acres of continental shelf in the Beaufort Sea, north of the Yukon and Northwest Territories cash advance.

Bids will be accepted until June 2, when the rights will be issued.

There are more than two dozen "significant discovery" leases across Canadian Arctic waters.

The WWF has said Canada's decision to open bidding rights in the Beaufort Sea will destroy large swaths of critical polar bear habitat and put the animal's future in danger.

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The Supreme Court on Monday ruled that cities and states can keep offering special tax breaks on their municipal bonds, a decision that preserves a top incentive for investors in the $2.5 trillion municipal bond market.

The 7-2 high-court ruling reversed a Kentucky appeals court decision that said it was unconstitutional for the state to grant tax breaks on interest from bonds issued in Kentucky while taxing interest from bonds issued in other states.

The high-court decision was an important victory for municipal bond issuers in most states. Without the special tax breaks, municipal bond issuers would have to compensate investors with higher interest rates.

The decision overturned a Kentucky appeals court ruling that the state’s tax breaks violate the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution, or an implied prohibition against states erecting trade barriers.

The ruling lifted a threat to an important segment of the mutual fund industry. The nearly 500 funds organized around bonds issued in a single-state would have had to disband or rearrange if the lower court ruling had been upheld. According to the Investment Company Institute, single-state funds had total assets of $155.83 billion in 2007.

“This removes a cloud of uncertainty that had been hanging over the market for at least six months cash advance usa. It will help heal the market,” said Bob Millikan, portfolio manager at BB&T Asset Management in Raleigh, North Carolina. “Many of the states that had been at risk of losing their specialty status will benefit. Their prices had been lower because of that risk.”

All told, 42 states follow Kentucky’s practice, and a Supreme Court ruling to uphold the lower court decision would have forced them to change their systems, with each state having to decide either to tax interest on in-state bonds or give breaks to out-of-state ones. Interest earned on municipal bonds is not subject to federal tax.

“We believe the court properly determined that municipal bonds are different with regard to the Commerce Clause,” said Tom Dresslar, spokesman for California Treasurer Bill Lockyer. “We’re not out to make a buck. When we issue these bonds it’s to provide a public service.” 

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