AP - The government will buy an ownership stake in a broad array of American banks for the first time since the Great Depression, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said late Friday, announcing the historic step after stock markets jolted still lower around the world despite all efforts to slow the selling stampede.

AP - General Motors Corp. and Chrysler LLC have held preliminary talks about a merger or an acquisition of Chrysler by GM, according to published reports Saturday.

AP - Wall Street capped one of its worst weeks ever with a wild session Friday that saw the Dow Jones industrials gyrate within a 1,000 point range before closing with a relatively mild loss and the Nasdaq composite index actually ending with a modest advance.

Reuters - General Motors is in preliminary talks about a possible merger with fellow U.S. automaker Chrysler, The New York Times reported late on Friday.

AP - Prices at the pump are dropping fast, and gas could fall below $3 a gallon in a matter of weeks, if not sooner. Does that mean Americans will return to their heedless, gas-guzzling ways?

AP - Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said Friday that the Bush administration will move ahead with a plan to buy stock in financial institutions.

AP - General Motors Corp. is likely to announce further production cuts and possible plant closures as early as next week as it deals with slumping sales and a collapse in its stock price, a person with knowledge of the company's plans said Friday.

AP - Davey McKeever was down to his last bet slip of the night, crumpled in a sweaty fist, at the Shelbourne Park greyhound track. The remnants of McKeever's first unemployment check would rise or fall on the ironically named Nest Egg.

AP - "There's nothing that's come anywhere near this."

AP - The stunning collapse in oil markets accelerated Friday, sending a barrel of crude plunging below $78 as investors grow more pessimistic about resolving a mushrooming global economic crisis.

AP - World markets were caught in Wall Street's downdraft as fears over a global financial crisis sent investors fleeing for the exits.

AP - Sellers of insurance on bonds issued by bankrupt Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. are now likely to face demands that they pay out more than 91 cents on the dollar to buyers of those insurance contracts.

Reuters - General Motors has had talks with smaller rival Chrysler LLC about a merger that would combine the No. 1 and No. 3 American automakers at a time when both are struggling to cut costs and shore up cash, according to a source briefed on the matter.

AP - Just a year ago, investors were swaggering as the stock market surged to an all-time high. Now, almost everyone on Wall Street and Main Street seems to be shuddering amid a frightening reversal of fortune that has erased $8.3 trillion in shareholder wealth in the past 366 days.

AFP - The US government plans to invest directly in US banks for the first time since the Great Depression, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said Friday, expanding the focus of the government's 700-billion-dollar rescue plan.

Reuters - Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc (MUFG) could seek to renegotiate the terms of a planned $9 billion cash injection into investment bank Morgan Stanley, CNBC reported on Friday, even as sources told Reuters the deal was still on track to close on Tuesday.