The eurozone is stuck in recession — its longest since the euro was founded in 1999. The latest figures from the European Union's statistics office show that the economy of the 17 EU countries that use the euro shrank for a sixth straight quarter, slumping by 0.2 percent in the January-March period from the previous three months.

By Ed Stoddard MARIKANA, South Africa (Reuters) - Workers at Lonmin's South African platinum shafts were ending a walkout, the company said on Wednesday, easing fears that a two-day strike could ignite fresh labor violence in the continent's largest economy. Leaders of the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (AMCU) earlier told thousands of strikers at a rally to return to their posts, pending negotiations between the union and an independent mediator. ...

OTTAWA (Reuters) - The Bank of Canada should raise interest rates now because five years of low rates are creating distortions in the economy, such as excessive debt and an overheated housing market, a former adviser to central bank Governor Mark Carney said on Wednesday. In a hawkish stand at odds with most economists and market players, Paul Masson, now a professor at the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management, said the central bank should tighten monetary policy to ... more

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - EU antitrust regulators are investigating whether Spain's plan to offer a 25.2 million euros ($32.71 million) grant to Ford Motor Co's plant will give the U.S. carmaker an unfair advantage. Ford is overhauling its European operations by cutting jobs and closing plants in Belgium and two British locations, as the economic downturn dampens consumer appetite for new cars and trucks. The company, which holds about 8 percent of the European market, expects to lose $2 billion in ... more

PARIS (Reuters) - BNP Paribas , France's No. 1 bank, told shareholders it expects a "significant" drop in staffing levels in its home market as it moves to offset the shrinking economy. BNP, which is highly exposed to mature European markets, is in the early stages of a plan to cut 2 billion euros ($2.57 billion) in annual costs over the next three years and is set to launch a new Europe-wide online bank. "Our employee levels will go down ... more