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Six months ago, the Bush administration quietly eased some restrictions on the export of sensitive technologies to China. The new approach was intended to help American companies increase sales of high-tech equipment to China despite tight curbs on sharing technology that might have military applications.

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- Penn Treaty American Corp. said Monday that it has retained Friedman, Billings, Ramsey & Co. to assist its board in reviewing strategic alternatives, which could include partnerships or the sale of certain assets. Based on a preliminary report by its actuarial consultants, the Allentown, Pa., insurance company believes that it will have to increase claim reserves and that there may be offsetting or partially offsetting reductions in active life reserves. The valuation analysis is expected to be completed during the first quarter of 2008. Shares of Penn Treaty closed Friday at $6.49.

NEW YORK–American and European banks including Citigroup Inc. and HSBC Holdings PLC are considering selling off parts of their businesses as they prepare for tough times ahead, the Wall Street Journal reported.

LONDON (MarketWatch) -- Banks including Citigroup and HSBC Holdings are considering sales of everything from branches to entire units, The Wall Street Journal reported Friday, citing analysts and unnamed executives. Citi could sell 80%-held Student Loan Corp , its North American auto-lending unit, its 24% stake in Brazil credit card operation Redecard and the bank's Japanese consumer finance business, the report said. New Citigroup CEO Vikram Pandit is considering laying off as many as 20,000 employees and shedding business lines, the report continued, citing people familiar with the matter. HSBC may sell its auto-finance business, the report added.

Asian markets advanced, with the MSCI regional index rising 2%, as an upbeat report on US consumer spending lifted exporters and manufacturers that are dependent on American demand

TV Guide Network's name will expand--for the first time--into radio with a daily entertainment report. The host, "American Idol" finalist Kimberly Caldwell" will do original reporting as well as re-purpose her TV Guide Network shows.

(Crain's) -- The American Tort Reform Assn. on Tuesday identified Cook County as one of six jurisdictions most unfair for those who are sued. It was the sixth year the group put out the report; Cook County also was on it in 2005 and 2006. The report, which identified six so-called "judicial ...

Wealthy Americans who claim nondomicile status in Britain have complained to the Government that they will be unfairly singled out under its plans to impose a new tax on foreign workers. Proposals for a £30,000 charge on nondomiciled residents (or so-called nondoms), outlined in a Treasury consultation paper last week, have prompted an angry response from Americans. The US Embassy has met British representatives to outline the US nondoms’ concerns that they will be unfairly charged. The Americans also argue that they may be forced to complete two separate tax returns, creating a headache for accountants. But the Treasury has hit back, saying its proposals are fair and that any fault lies with the US tax system. The new charge was outlined by Alistair Darling, the Chancellor, in his PreBudget Report in October. It would be paid annually by anyone who has claimed nondom status for seven out of the past ten years, and is due to begin in April. The aim is to redress the unfair system under which foreign workers, who pay no tax to their home country while working in Britain, can also exempt themselves from tax on their overseas earnings. But unlike almost every other country, the US imposes taxes on its citizens even when they are working abroad. Americans can usually offset British taxes against their US bill. But the US Embassy has told the Treasury that the proposed charge cannot be offset, because it has no equivalent in the US tax code. A spokesman for the US Embassy said: “The US Government is studying the potential impact on American citizens of the proposed tax changes in the recently released consultation paper issued by HM Treasury. “We have heard concerns raised by the American community in the UK about this and have, and will continue to, pass on those concerns to HM Government officials in our meetings with them.” Americans who choose to end their nondom status will not have to pay the charge, but will face the hassle of filling in tax returns for both jurisdictions. A Treasury official confirmed that the embassy had explained how the proposals would work for US citizens, who make up a large proportion of the estimated 110,000 nondoms in Britain. But he said: “It is quite right that people who have made their home in the UK should make a fair contribution to the UK. The US charges people on their worldwide income, as opposed to by residence, which is

COMPANIES from the United States have seen their businesses grow more robust in the Chinese mainland this year, and the growth will continue with many planning to expand investment, said a report by the American Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai yesterday. Despite the positive outlook, rising competition and costs are increasingly squeezing margins for US companies, said the 2007 China Business Report, which contains an online survey result drawn from the 270 AmCham Shanghai corporate members. "China continues to be a strong investment destination for the US. Despite increasing cost pressures, the results of the survey show that it was a good year for American business in China," said Eric Fiedler, chairman of AmCham Shanghai. "US companies feel the investment climate in China has improved overall during the past few years and they are looking at new opportunities to expand into second- and third-tier cities." According to the survey, 88 percent of

American Italian Pasta Co. is late filing its annual report with the Securities and Exchange Commission for the fiscal year that ended Sept. 28.

No, as recent successes show. But "winning" will take many years, and cannot be achieved by force alone IF YOU rub your eyes, take a deep breath and look with an open mind at the numbers, the conclusion is unmistakable: things are going a lot better in Iraq. From Afghanistan, too, comes the occasional report of a significant success. This week, for example, American and British soldiers helped Afghan government troops wrest the symbolically important town of Musa Qala back from the Taliban. Is it possible that after four and six years respectively, the American-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are at last beginning to come good? Our reports this week from the front-lines of both wars (see article and article) suggest that the answer to that question should be a guarded yes. In Iraq General David Petraeus's "surge" and a Sunni backlash against al-Qaeda have sharply reduced the killing. It is true that more than 20 civilians are still killed on an average day, but it was not uncommon a year ago to find as many as 100 corpses at dawn. In Afghanistan the yes is more tentative. Violence is spreading and suicide-bombings, less frequent now in Iraq, are taking a rising toll. But as the winter snow begins to fall, American and NATO forces have reached the end of the fighting season without suffering the big reverses they feared at its beginning. As Gordon Brown, Britain's prime minister, boasted this week, it is NATO that took the offensive this year. And in some parts of the country, such as the region around Khost, more Afghans seem ready to transfer their allegiance from the Taliban to the elected government. ...

LONDON (Reuters) - Xstrata Plc , the world's sixth-biggest mining company, is open to talks with potential suitors, including Vale and Anglo American , the Financial Times said on Tuesday.

The mining majors have kept the rumour mill busy recently, and talk yesterday was of another mega merger battle set to erupt. The prize at stake is Xstrata, so the talk goes, with stories of Anglo American coming in with a £42-per-share offer.

Stocks were flat after a healthy jobs report failed to extend the market's recent rally. Worries about consumer credit cast a shadow as American Express shares weighed on the Dow industrials following a downgrade.

Britain's penal system is looking less European and more American IN THE sunny early days of Gordon Brown's premiership, it seemed for a while that a radical change in penal policy was on the horizon. "We cannot carry on building prisons indefinitely and we need to look at new approaches," Lord Falconer, then the justice minister, had said in May. Two months later his successor, Jack Straw, called for a "national conversation" about the use of custody. The prison system, one of the few public services not yet thoroughly overhauled by Labour, looked like a place for Mr Brown to leave his mark. That now seems unlikely. On December 5th Mr Straw announced plans to build yet more prisons, as recommended in a report that day by Lord Carter, a favourite government problem-solver (and once the best man at Mr Straw's wedding). With their 81,000 jail places full up, England and Wales already lock away more of their population than any western European country bar Luxembourg. At a cost of GBP2.7 billion, Mr Straw now plans to add 15,000 more places by 2014. ...

The American economy appears to have created far fewer jobs in the spring than has been reported so far, a new government report indicated Friday.

American lives are at risk because the Food and Drug Administration lacks the funding to keep up with scientific advances, agency advisers said.

Corporate Japan has devised a new industrial model, but further reform is still needed HOW much has corporate Japan changed in the past decade? A great deal, say optimists, who point to all the things that are different; not enough, say pessimists, who point to everything that has stayed the same. Both are right. In recent years Japanese companies have emerged from the gloom of the 1990s with the help of a new industrial model that combines elements of the old Japanese way of doing things with some carefully chosen bits of American capitalism. As our special report in this issue argues, the result is a hybrid, an effort to achieve the best of both worlds--rather as a Toyota Prius combines the range of a petrol engine with the energy efficiency of an electric motor. Many Japanese companies now provide merit-based pay and share options, for example, but not to the extent that American firms do. There is more shareholder activism and more mergers and acquisitions, but activists and acquirers are expected to be polite. And although the older salarymen get to keep their jobs for life, the young are less inclined to offer to "bury their bones" at the company that first hires them, and are keener on playing the market and moving around. ...

American farmers no longer have to stoically face all that Mother Nature and the economy can dish out. At least eight states offer free mental health hot lines to assist farmers and producers through difficult patches. During times of exceptional drought, such as the one that has covered the Southeast this year, the hot lines report a jump in calls from farmers needing emotional counseling and stress management.

Mistakes from one privatisation may hold important lessons for Northern Rock WHEN private-equity firms bubble into the public consciousness, they are generally viewed with disdain as the embodiment of capitalism red in tooth and claw. Rarely are they seen as a force for good, or as protectors of the public interest. So the industry's opponents--of whom there are many--are likely to react with glee to a report due to be released by the National Audit Office (NAO) on November 23rd. The spending watchdog lambasts the government for its handling of the sale of QinetiQ, once the Ministry of Defence's research arm. The deal has attracted much attention, not just because it was unusual--few governments are willing to part with the most sensitive bits of their defence industry--but also because of how much money was made on it. Carlyle Group, an American private-equity firm with an uncommon penchant for hiring former heads of state, invested GBP42m ($74m, at the exchange rate of the day) to acquire 34% of QinetiQ in 2003. More than three years later, when the company was floated on the stockmarket, Carlyle's share was worth GBP374m. The civil-service managers of QinetiQ did well too. Stocks for which the ten most senior ones together paid little more than GBP0.5m increased in value to GBP107m. ...