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While Southwest Airlines commercial jets picked up scores of passengers Wednesday at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport, a single-engine Cessna taxied to gate E33 where a small group of passengers quietly waited for their flight to Burlington, Iowa.
The Burlington flight is one of a handful of departures offered by Air Choice One. Based in south St. […]

Fixed mortgage rates fell to at or near record lows. That’s good news for the few who can afford to buy a home or are able to refinance. But the rates have done little to lift the ailing housing market.
Freddie Mac said Thursday that the average rate for the 30-year fixed mortgage fell to 4.32 […]

Ivory Coast’s president is setting up an independent commission to investigate human rights abuses committed during Ivory Coast’s postelection crisis earlier this year.
Government spokesman Bruno Kone on Wednesday read a presidential decree creating the commission, after a special Cabinet meeting. The decree gives the commission six months to present its findings.
The commission will attempt to […]

When Toronto teacher Michael Bennett goes shopping in Buffalo he uses his Canadian credit card. When the bills come, he barely notices the foreign exchange fee.
The loonie trading above par with the U.S. dollar is luring Canadian shoppers like him across the border in droves.
But is using a Canadian credit card the smartest approach? […]

The proposed takeover of the Toronto Stock Exchange

After weeks of pain at the gas pump and the grocery store, the worst appears to be over.
Oil prices have fallen, with gas soon to follow. Demand for farm commodities, like the corn used in everything from cereal to soda, has dropped. And businesses remain slow to pass along higher costs because customers aren’t getting […]

Crews using bore holes and probes failed to find evidence of a miner who was trapped deep underground when part of an Idaho silver mine collapsed more than a week ago.
Hecla Mining Co. said Saturday that rescuers neared the section of a collapsed tunnel where they had hoped to find 53-year-old Larry Marek. But the […]

Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s push for NATO to take command of the Libyan no-fly zone shows how Muammar Qaddafi’s former friend is trying to hedge his bets over the civil war in Italy’s one-time colony.
“Italy is in a tight spot; it has the most to lose,” said Nicolo Sartori, an analyst at the Rome-based […]

The Federal Reserve on Friday cleared the way for some major banks to boost stock dividends, prompting announcements from JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo and U.S. Bancorp.
JPMorgan Chase said it is increasing its dividend to 25 cents a share from 5 cents, Wells Fargo hiked its dividend to 12 cents a share from 5 cents and […]