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NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. officials are weighing a plan to let borrowers who have fallen behind on mortgage payments avoid eviction by renting their home instead, sources familiar with the administration's thinking said on Tuesday.

WASHINGTON - Consumer prices shot up in June by the largest amount in 11 months, reflecting the biggest jump in gasoline prices in nearly five years.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Obama administration on Wednesday will propose that hedge fund managers submit to new registration and disclosure rules to boost transparency and limit any risks they pose to the financial system, a senior U.S. Treasury official said.

DETROIT (Reuters) - Former General Motors Corp Chairman and Chief Executive Rick Wagoner, ousted in March by the Obama administration, will retire in August with a package worth $8.6 million in the first five years, the company said on Tuesday.

WASHINGTON - With banks repaying bailout money, credit markets beginning to flow and Goldman Sachs posting stunning profits, the financial sector would appear to be stabilizing. But CIT Group Inc., one of the nation's largest lenders to small- and mid-sized businesses, teeters on the brink of collapse.

WHITE PLAINS, New York (Reuters) - Hedge fund swindler Samuel Israel was ordered to serve two more years behind bars on Wednesday for a wild escapade in which he faked his own death in an attempt to avoid a 20-year prison sentence.

WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. officials are considering giving CIT Group Inc a temporary loan as part of an aid package to help the lender avoid collapse, a source familiar with regulators' thinking said on Tuesday.

ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates - U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner pressed ahead with his sales pitch to Gulf Arab nations Wednesday, telling oil-rich Mideast allies Washington is committed to keeping the dollar strong and promoting sustainable growth as the world pulls out of a recession.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Data released on Wednesday suggested the U.S. recession might be loosening its grip, although analysts cautioned recovery was likely to be long and slow.

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Intel Corp's quarterly results and outlook blew past Wall Street forecasts on better-than-expected consumer demand for PCs, especially in Asia, setting an auspicious tone for the technology sector.

NEW YORK - One trip for their Jack Russell terrier in a plane's cargo hold was enough to convince Alysa Binder and Dan Wiesel that owners needed a better option to get their pets from one city to another.

NEW YORK - Investors are betting on the economy again.

NEW YORK - The state attorney general may press for a legal settlement with Steven Rattner, until recently a key Obama administration adviser on the auto industry, over possible civil charges in a pay-to-play investigation, The Associated Press has learned.

CHICAGO - Over the river and through the recession to grandmother's house they go. The lingering recession is forcing cash-strapped parents to cancel camp for the kids. Instead, they're being packed off to their grandparents'.

Amid all the pomposity surrounding discussions of the credit crisis ("capitalism is over!", "hang anyone with a pinstriped suit!") it is easy to forget what truly triggered the malaise. Simply put: A tiny bunch of guys (some gals, too) inside a handful of financial institutions made hugely leveraged, often complex, massively sized bets on the health of the (mostly U.S.) subprime housing market. As the latter inevitably turned sour, those bets inevitably sank the punters, and as these behemoths floundered, so did the financial system and thus the economy at large.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Calpers, the biggest U.S. public pension fund, has sued the three largest credit rating agencies for giving perfect grades to securities that later suffered huge subprime mortgage losses.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. stocks rallied further on Wednesday, sparked by strong results from bellwether Intel Corp that lifted hopes for a rebound in technology spending and fueled optimism for the earnings season.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. mortgage applications rose for a second straight week, driven by a jump in demand for home refinancing loans as interest rates tumbled, data from an industry group showed on Wednesday.

LONDON (Reuters) - Global stocks rose to their highest level in nearly two weeks on Wednesday as blockbuster results from major firms such as tech bellwether Intel Corp underpinned appetite for riskier assets.

BOSTON - Shareholders at four Fidelity Investments mutual funds have rejected a measure that seeks to screen out investments possibly linked to genocide in international hot spots like Sudan's Darfur region.

NEW YORK - Goldman Sachs is emerging as the king of post-meltdown Wall Street.

DALLAS - Federal safety officials are investigating how a foot-long hole opened in the top of a Southwest Airlines jet, forcing the aircraft to make an emergency landing in Charleston, W. Va.

WASHINGTON — The federal deficit has topped $1 trillion for the first time ever and could grow to nearly $2 trillion by this fall, intensifying fears about higher interest rates, inflation and the strength of the dollar.

JEDDAH (Reuters) - U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said on Tuesday he saw signs of confidence returning to the U.S. financial sector and pledged that the United States would pursue policies that preserve the dollar's value.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Goldman Sachs Group Inc said quarterly earnings surged 33 percent on blowout trading results, trouncing forecasts and putting the bank on pace for hefty bonuses that could draw unwanted scrutiny.

NEW YORK/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - CIT Group Inc and government officials remained locked in talks on Tuesday as the lender to thousands of small businesses pushed for government aid in its fight to survive.

SEATTLE (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp's chief executive attempted to laugh off the challenge of Google Inc's planned computer operating system on Tuesday, conceding only that it was "interesting".

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Goldman Sachs Group Inc executives sold almost $700 million worth of stock since the collapse of rival Lehman Brothers last year, the Financial Times said on Monday.

WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - Steven Rattner will leave as head of the U.S. autos task force, which oversaw bankruptcies at General Motors Corp and Chrysler Group, at a time when a probe into how the private equity firm he co-founded gained New York pension business has intensified.

LONDON (Reuters) - Struggling flag carrier British Airways said on Tuesday it was considering launching a convertible bond, not a rights issue, to shore up its balance sheet during the global aviation sector downturn.