Asia’s economic growth is set to quicken to 6.6 percent this year, but recovery from the global economic crisis remains fragile and stimulus exit strategies must be carefully timed, the Asian Development Bank said Thursday.

China’s lavish bank lending spurred a recovery but also pumped up markets as speculators scooped up stocks and property and even dabbled in garlic, dried chilli pepper and luxury Pu’er tea.

Public schools will need greater flexibility — including the ability to modify teacher contracts — to weather a proposed $27 million midyear cut, the Idaho Department of Education said.

Ten months into President Barack Obama’s first economic stimulus plan, a surge in spending on roads and bridges has had no effect on local unemployment and only barely helped the beleaguered construction industry, an Associated Press analysis has found.

California banking regulators have ordered the liquidation of a small Central Valley credit union — the first U.S. credit union to fail in 2010.

The Icelandic parliament decided after an emergency session Friday how to stage a national referendum on repaying $5.7 billion to Britain and the Netherlands — a poll that is seen as a defining moment in the bankrupted country’s economic recovery.

When most people think of electronic book readers, Amazon’s thin, white Kindle probably springs to mind. But that could be about to change.

Iceland’s president urged British leaders on Thursday to be cautious in their public statements about the diplomatic spat regarding his decision to send a controversial loan repayment bill to a national referendum — warning that their remarks are being closely watched in Iceland.

Millions of German bank cards have been affected by a “millennium bug”-like problem because they contain software that can’t process the number 2010, industry groups said Tuesday.

For car buyers, four words mean the difference between going home in a new sedan or their old clunker: Your loan is approved.