TOP STORIES 
 
GLOBAL MARKETS RALLY ON CHINA, DRAGHI 

Global financial markets rallied after China's central bank cut interest rates and the ECB's president reiterated the institution was ready to expand its stimulus program. Dow Jones Industrial Average up more than 160 points.

 
CHINA CUTS INTEREST RATES 
 

China cut lending rates for the first time in more than two years, in an acknowledgment that its piecemeal efforts to bolster its flagging growth have failed.

 
ECB SIGNALS AGGRESSIVE ACTION ON INFLATION 
 

European Central Bank President Mario Draghi sent a strong signal that the central bank is ready to "step up the pressure" and expand its asset-purchase programs if inflation fails to show signs of quickly returning to the ECB's target.

 
U.S. ORDERS ELECTRIC UTILITIES TO SECURE SITES 
 

Federal energy regulators ordered the nation's utilities to protect important electrical equipment from potential attackers trying to disrupt the U.S. electric grid.

 
SOTHEBY'S CEO RUPRECHT TO STEP DOWN 
 

Chief Executive William Ruprecht is leaving Sotheby's, months after hedge-fund activist Dan Loeb and several others joined the auction house's board. The company said the departure was by mutual agreement with the board. Sotheby's shares up 7%.

 
OIL PRICES RISE ON CHINA'S SURPRISE RATES CUTS 
 

Crude oil prices jumped after China surprised the market by cutting key interest rates. The Brent crude oil contract had been close to neutral but rose sharply, by around 70 cents a barrel after the announcement.

 
FOOT LOCKER PROFIT GROWS 15%, TOPS ESTIMATES 
 

Foot Locker's 3Q profit grew a bigger-than-expected 15% to $120 million, or 82c a share, as sales surged to $1.73 billion, capping a successful run at the helm of the specialty athletic retailer for Chief Executive Ken Hicks.

 
JAPAN ATTEMPTS TO HALT YEN SLIDE 
 

Japan's finance minister moved for the first time to get the yen's rapid fall under control, the clearest sign yet that a weak currency is beginning to complicate the country's aggressive experiment to restore growth.

 
RUSSIAN GDP GROWTH BEATS EXPECTATIONS 
 

Russia's economy expanded 0.8% in the first 10 months of the year, beating expectations despite a fall in capital investment, official data shows

 
FRANCE INVESTIGATING HSBC'S SWISS UNIT 
 

French prosecutors said they are investigating the Swiss unit of HSBC Holdings for allegedly laundering the proceeds of tax fraud, marking the latest international probe into aiding of offshore-tax evasion by Swiss banks.

 
BLACKSTONE TO BUY GE'S JAPAN PROPERTY BUSINESS 
 

U.S. investment firm Blackstone Group said it had reached an agreement to buy General Electric's residential real-estate business in Japan for more than Yen190 billion ($1.6 billion).

 
 
 
 
  ======= DOW JONES NEWSWIRES ANALYSIS AND COMMENTARIES ======= 
 
 
Money Talks 
BRINGING ON THE CURRENCY WARS 
 

Central bankers struggling against weak growth and falling inflation have come up with a cunning plan: shift the problems onto someone else. Alen Mattich explains.

 
Heard on the Street 
CHINA RATE CUT SURPRISES, DOESN'T OVERWHELM 
 

Beijing blinked. That doesn't mean the view of China's economy has all of a sudden gotten much clearer.