Oil prices cross $57 again
New York: Oil prices crossed $57 a barrel again on fears about OPEC's ability to increase official output. The Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries is considering raising daily production by an additional 5,00,000 barrels.

This comes on the back of last week's similar hike.

Light sweet crude for April delivery was up 30 cents to $57.02 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. On Friday, the benchmark commodity surged 32 cents to close at $56.72. In London, Brent crude for May was up 9 cents, fetching $55.68 a barrel on the International Petroleum Exchange.
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EU nations agree on euro stability rules
Brussels: European Union finance ministers have settled on a reform of rules that guarantees the stability of the euro, satisfying German and French demands that euro-zone nations be given more room to spend their way out of economic problems.

Luxembourg Premier Jean-Claude Juncker, currently holding the rotating EU presidency, said that national budget deficits would still not be allowed to exceed three percent of gross domestic product. The rule that a country's debt cannot exceed 60 percent of GDP remained another key euro stability target, he said.

Governments that run excessive deficits "temporarily" would be able to escape from immediate sanctions if they showed their spending served a worthwhile goal such as funding for research and development, defence or economic and social restructuring. Any country exceeding the deficit cap might get up to five years to come back into compliance.

In recent years, France and Germany had ignored instructions from the EU to reverse their excessive deficits.

Germany - whose deficit has been in excess of three percent of GDP for the last three years - asked that its German reunification funding be a seen as a credible reason to violate the euro rules. Since 1990, it has spent some $2 trillion to help the former East Germany shed its communist legacy in a funding programme that expires in 2019.

Germany also wants to use its large contributions to the EU budget - it pays 22 per cent - as a mitigating circumstance to miss the deficit rule.

The euro is the common currency of twelve EU nations: France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Ireland, Austria, Finland and Greece.
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