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comScore, a leader in measuring the digital world, reported U.S. retail e-commerce spending for the first 26 days of the November – December 2010 holiday season. For the holiday season-to-date, $11.64 billion has been spent online, marking a 13-percent increase versus the corresponding days last year. Black Friday (November 26) saw $648 million in online sales, making it the heaviest online spending day to date in 2010 and representing a 9-percent increase versus Black Friday 2009. Thanksgiving Day (November 26), traditionally a lighter day for online holiday spending, achieved a strong 28-percent increase to $407 million.

Economic confidence among the nation’s small business owners continued to improve in November, according to the Discover® Small Business WatchSM. The monthly index rose to 87.2 in November, up 3 points from 84.2 in October – the third consecutive monthly gain, and nearly 11 points higher than a year ago.

The Conference Board Leading Economic Index® (LEI) for the Euro Area increased 0.4 percent and The Conference Board Coincident Economic Index® (CEI) remained unchanged in October.

eCoupons.com announced that more consumers in China will shop online on Cyber Monday than in the U.S., UK, Germany and Japan. According to a new eCoupons.com/Ipsos global survey, 22% of Chinese plan to shop online on November 29 versus 17% in the U.S. Cyber Monday, one of the busiest shopping days of the year, is the Monday after Black Friday where retailers offer big discounts online. During Cyber Monday week, from November 29 to December 6, 61% of Chinese plan to shop online versus 45% in the UK, 43% in the U.S., 37% in Germany and 34% in Japan.

Electronics were among the most popular items purchased this weekend, as more consumers bought electronics this Thanksgiving weekend than last year, according to interim results from a new survey from the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA)® and CARAVAN®.

Donating to charity is an important holiday tradition with many families planning to give at least $50 to charitable groups during this holiday season, according to a national survey by the American Red Cross.

A rapid rise of corporate bond issuance in emerging East Asia has driven the growth in the region's local currency bond markets to just over $5 trillion.

After six years of steady growth, the EU27 trade in goods with Africa dropped in 2009, with exports falling by 10% and imports by one third, compared with 2008. As a result, the EU27 deficit in trade with Africa, which reached a peak of 40 billion euro in 2008, turned into a small surplus of 1 bn in 2009.

The annual growth rate of M3 stood at 1.0% in October 2010, compared with 1.1% in September 2010. The three-month average of the annual growth rates of M3 over the period August 2010 - October 2010 rose to 1.1%, from 0.8% in the period July 2010 - September 2010.

Costs of labour market adjustment can be more widely shared in publicly subsidised short-time working schemes, according to the 2010 Annual Report from the European Restructuring Monitor, presented at the European Employment Forum in Brussels. Just as the last two decades saw a reorientation from passive to active labour market policy, so should a flexicurity-aligned system of short-time working adopt a more active stance, Eurofound argues in its report.