Quick Overview

• U.S. pending home sales fell 7.7% in January, weaker than expected.
  

• Australia kept rates unchanged at 3.25%
  

• Canada reduced its interest rate from 1.0% to .50%
  

• Fed Chairman Bernanke said policy makers may need to expand aid to the banking system beyond the $700 billion already approved.
  

• (Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve lifted executive- compensation limits for sponsors of asset-backed securities accepted under a new $1 trillion loan program.
  

• The International Cocoa Organization expects world cocoa production down 5% in 2008-2009, and a supply deficit of 193,000 tons.

• Ford reports February sales fell 48.4%.

• Canada’s largest lumber producer, said it would expand shutdowns of sawmills

• (Bloomberg) -- Chinese state stockpiling of copper may mean the withdrawal of about a quarter of the metal held in warehouses

• CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico (Reuters) - Hundreds of heavily armed soldiers fanned out across Mexico's bloodiest drug war city on Tuesday, trying to prevent a collapse in law and order just south of the U.S. border.

• EU officials voted to impose a duty on biodiesel imports from the U.S. to counteract a U.S. tax credit.

• California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has called on world leaders to stop "whining and complaining" about the economic slowdown.