You can get almost anything from a conbini: breakfast, underpants, tickets to a rock concert … oh, and returns too. Ubiquitous Japanese convenience stores stormed the best-performers' league tables last year

Amid the steepest global property downturn in decades, China is expediting plans to allow developers to raise funds through public real estate investment trusts, or Reits

In Asia, politics and terrorism further queer the pitch. Tourism there actually began contracting in August

It is almost impossible to say conclusively what effect boosts from fiscal packages have

The German banking giant has been forced into the chill embrace of Angela Merkel's government.

Wal-Mart, one of only two members of the Dow to have made gains last year, missed expectations for December

Fraud is closely correlated with the business cycle and investors should wake up and check their wallets

Exelon is showing more persistence than NRG, its takeover target, thought likely when it launched its bid in October

The American recovery and reinvestment plan will be welcomed to the US's drawn-out recessionary bash

The world's top 10 drug companies are sitting on more than $85bn in cash and short-term securities. And they are getting ready to use it

Law firms traditionally lag the onset of a business downturn by about a year – but this time it is different

Germany is about to change its opposition to Keynesian stimulus packages as exports and demand plummet

Fuel deals struck at the top of the market last summer are starting to hit the wrong-way betters of the airline world

Kiev has little choice but to bite the bullet and pay market prices for Russian gas

The world's biggest government bond market now wants to ramp up overseas sales