Business news for Thu, 29 Nov 2007 & with words market+million. 7 news.

Investment in the AdBrite online ad marketplace follows an even larger funding announcement for rival Specific Media as the market heats up.

National Australia Bank agreed to buy Great Western Bank for $798 million, as it expands its agribusiness banking model into the American Midwest farming market.

HipCricket Inc. this week began listing its shares on the London Stock Exchange's Alternative Investment Market (AIM) and raised slightly more than $17 million in an initial placement of 3.16 million shares.

ASTON Martin, the British iconic car maker made famous by suave British secret agent James Bond in his movies, yesterday drove into China's rapidly growing luxury sports car market when it opened its first showroom in Shanghai. The Shanghai Aston Martin Retail Center, franchised by GruppeM and located in Xintiandi, extends Aston Martin's global dealership network into China for the first time in the company's 94-year history. The country's flagship store boasts a double-deck exhibition space which is designed to hold five sleek models including the DB9 Volante, DB9 coupe and V8 Vantage. These models went on sale yesterday with prices costing between two million yuan (US$270,270) and three million yuan each. Aston Martin will also build an exclusive service facility close to Hongqiao airport in Shanghai. Its second showroom in China will soon open in Beijing early next month. "China is one of the fastest growing markets which Aston Martin has not previously made a

CREDIT Industriel et Commercial, Europe's third largest bank based in France, expects to find local partners to tap the mainland's private banking business, said company executive yesterday. "If there are any opportunities for CIC and banks in China to incorporate, we can't ignore them. Our proposals are open," said Timothy K. Lo, managing director of CIC Investor Services Ltd, the bank's Hong Kong subsidiary. CIC has partnered with Hong Kong's Bank of East Asia since 2003 to provide private banking and asset management services for mainland clients with offshore assets. But BEA has set up its own private banking service in Hong Kong last year and will start a similar service soon on the mainland, according to Lo. The fast expanding wealth of Chinese mainlanders boosted CIC's interest in the market. "We target the high-end sector and our clients are required to have a minimum non-fixed assets of US$1 million, referring to liquid capital such as cash, equities

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- In a possible sign of a weakening labor market, the number of Americans getting state jobless benefits rose to a nearly two-year high in the latest week, the government said Thursday. Continuing jobless claims rose by 112,000 in the week ending Nov. 17, to 2.66 million, the highest mark since Dec. 24, 2005, the Labor Department said. Initial jobless claims also shot up in the latest week, the data show. Those claims rose by 23,000 to 352,000 during the week ending Nov. 24, their highest level since Feb. 10. The four-week moving averages for both initial claims and continuing claims also edged up in the latest surveys.

SINGAPORE'S state investment agency said it sold shares in two Chinese mainland banks this week, and media reports said the sales netted Temasek US$800 million in proceeds. Temasek sold 280 million shares in China Construction Bank yesterday, representing less than two percent of its holding in the bank, a company spokeswoman said today. Local media said the sale of the shares earned Temasek about HK$2 billion (US$256 million), but the spokeswoman would not confirm the amount. Two days earlier, Temasek confirmed it sold 1.08 billion shares in Bank of China for HK$4.45 billion, reducing its stake in the mainland lender from 15.5 percent to 14.2 percent. Both sales were part of Temasek's ongoing rebalancing of its portfolio, the spokeswoman said in a statement e-mailed to The Associated Press. China Construction Bank was the most heavily traded stock on the Hong Kong market today with shares worth HK$3.013 billion trading hands, including those placed by Temasek. The