VENTURE CAPITAL POST

The European Central Bank is poised to announce a plan on Thursday to buy government bonds, resorting to its last big policy tool for breathing life into the flagging euro zone economy and fending off deflation.

Oil prices edged up on Wednesday in a further sign of support around current levels, but analysts said the outlook for the next six months remained bleak due to oversupply.

The Bank of Japan cut next fiscal year's inflation forecast on Wednesday and expanded a loan scheme aimed at boosting lending, acting to deflect criticism that it is sitting idly as slumping oil prices keep inflation well short of its target.

Argentines have been complaining for a while now about the country's product shortages. And, until recently, the government has managed to brush aside such protests, which have centered around Argentina's import restrictions.

After a head-spinning bout of volatility, next week will be dominated by one question: Will the European Central Bank take the ultimate policy leap or pull its punches?

The Obama administration is asking Wall Street to explain why the yields investors are demanding to compensate them for inflation have dropped since August, the U.S. Treasury said on Friday.

U.S. consumer prices recorded their biggest drop in six years in December and a gauge of underlying inflation was flat, which could make the Federal Reserve more cautious about raising interest rates.

Tumbling oil prices have strengthened rather than weakened the Federal Reserve's resolve to start raising interest rates around midyear even as volatile markets and a softening U.S. inflation outlook made investors push back the timing of the "liftoff."

The Federal Reserve should leave short-term borrowing costs near zero for a seventh year in a row, a top Fed official urged on Thursday, citing sliding U.S. inflation and still-high unemployment.

China's annual economic growth likely slowed to 7.2 percent in the fourth quarter, the weakest since the depths of the global crisis, a Reuters poll showed, which would keep pressure on policymakers to head off a sharper slowdown this year.

The euro slumped to a nine-year low on Monday as investors bet that the prospect of inflation across the region turning negative and mounting political uncertainty in Greece will force the European Central Bank to unleash quantitative easing.

China's growth engine looks to have ended last year on a flat note as its massive factory sector sputtered in December, though ebbing price pressures also offered scope for more policy stimulus from Beijing and across much of Asia.

Bank of Japan Governor Haruhiko Kuroda said the bank has various tools left if it were to ease monetary policy again, stressing its determination to hit its inflation target in the next fiscal year.

An ice-cream store listed in the Guinness World Records book for its 863 different flavours has become the latest victim of Venezuela's economic crisis.

The European Central Bank should start buying government bonds to tackle poor investor confidence and low inflation in the euro zone, governing council member Luc Coene said in an interview published on Saturday.