By Tom Hals (Reuters) - Ally Financial Inc agreed to pay $2.1 billion to Residential Capital LLC to settle claims that it stripped the bankrupt mortgage subsidiary of choice assets. The deal will allow Ally to put behind it problems tied to mortgage lending so it can focus on its U.S. auto financing business and its online bank. The settlement also paves the way for ResCap to repay its creditors. Under the deal, detailed in a court filing on Thursday, Ally will pay $1.95 billion in cash and expects $150 million more to come from its insurers. ...

DENVER (AP) — In the most prominent challenge of its kind, Hobby Lobby Stores Inc. is asking a federal appeals court Thursday for an exemption from part of the federal health care law that requires it to offer employees health coverage that includes access to the morning-after pill.

An amazing photo of a stellar nursery located 6,500 light-years away from Earth marks the 15-year cosmic anniversary of a telescope in the Southern Hemisphere.

The venerable Mars rover Opportunity, the older and smaller cousin of Curiosity, has discovered another water-weathered rock hinting that the Red Planet could have supported life in its ancient past, NASA officials said.

NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks fell in early trading, extending a sell-off that began Wednesday afternoon, after Chinese manufacturing unexpectedly contracted and on concern that the Federal Reserve may ease back on its stimulus program.

A solar-powered airplane successfully completed the longest leg of its historic coast-to-coast flight across the United States today (May 23), landing in Dallas after nearly 20 hours in the air.

LONDON (Reuters) - Tesco executives will not receive a bonus in the current financial year unless they can reverse a decline in profits at Britain's biggest supermarket operator, the company said in its annual report on Thursday. The report rounds off a torrid year for the company, which announced a withdrawal from the United States and wrote down the value of its global operations by $3.5 billion due to the first fall in profit in two decades. ...

By Poornima Gupta and Padraic Halpin SAN FRANCISCO/DUBLIN (Reuters) - Apple has operated almost tax-free in Ireland since 1980, welcomed by a government keen to bring jobs to what was then one of Europe's poorest countries, former company executives and Irish officials have said. Chief Executive Tim Cook faced criticism from a Senate subcommittee in Washington on Tuesday over the iPad and iPhone maker's tax practices, which had been shrouded from full view behind secretive tax-exempt Irish-based corporate entities. ...

By Andy Bruce and Steven C. Johnson LONDON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - Chinese factory activity declined in May for the first time in seven months and U.S. manufacturing grew at its slowest clip since October, suggesting it may take a while before the global economy starts to pick up steam. Thursday's downbeat business surveys from the world's top two economies, however, may not assuage some of the market fears stoked this week by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, who hinted that the U.S. central bank could soon scale back monthly bond purchases provided the economy maintained recent momentum. ...

Heat-related deaths in New York City's borough of Manhattan may rise about 20 percent over the next decade, according to a new study.

By Chuck Mikolajczak NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks dropped on Thursday, with the S&P 500 on pace for its first back-to-back daily drop in a month amid investor concerns the U.S. Federal Reserve's stimulus may be scaled back sooner than hoped and after weak data in China. The S&P 500 had posted its biggest decline in three weeks on Wednesday after minutes from the latest U.S. Federal Reserve meeting showed some officials were open to tapering large-scale asset purchases as early as at the June meeting. ...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Sales of new homes rose in April to the second highest level since the summer of 2008 while the median price for a new home hit a record high, further signs that housing is recovering.

(Reuters) - Sales of new single-family homes rose 2.3 percent in April, and prices climbed to record high levels, offering strong proof the sector's rebound trend is intact. The Commerce Department said on Thursday sales increased to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 454,000 units. Economists polled by Reuters had expected sales to rise to 425,000-unit rate last month. The median sales price for a new home was $271,600, up 14.9 percent from a year ago, and the highest on record since the Commerce Department began tracking the data in the early 1960s. ...

By Lucia Mutikani WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits fell more than expected last week, pointing to resilience in the labor market despite belt-tightening by Washington. Still, other data on Thursday suggested the federal austerity drive was combining with weak overseas demand to hold U.S. factory activity in May to its weakest rate of growth in seven months. Initial claims for state unemployment benefits dropped more than expected last week, falling 23,000 to 340,000, the Labor Department said. ...

NEW YORK (AP) — Ralph Lauren Corp. reported a 35 percent increase in fourth-quarter profit as the luxury retailer benefited from lower cotton prices. But economic challenges here and abroad and the move to eliminate some businesses to focus on the most profitable ones cut into sales.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits fell 23,000 last week to a seasonally adjusted 340,000, a level consistent with solid job growth.

By Marc Jones LONDON (Reuters) - A senior central banker sought to give reassurance on Thursday that the Fed is in no hurry to start winding down its economic stimulus after comments by chairman Ben Bernanke sent stock markets tumbling. James Bullard, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, said on Thursday he did not think the Fed was "that close" to starting the process of winding down its support although it was the likely next step if the economy continued to improve and inflation picks up. ...

NEW YORK — Robots are simply more efficient than humans at certain tasks. They already excel at building cars, exploring distant planets and hunting for explosives, but it turns out that robots might also evolve much faster than their flesh-and-blood counterparts.

By John O'Donnell BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Europe's top regulatory official is seeking to force large companies to disclose how much tax they pay in each country where they operate, a measure some politicians say could curb tax avoidance. Michel Barnier, the European commissioner in charge of drafting business regulation, said in a speech in Amsterdam that rules which will force banks to report their profits, taxes and subsidies by country from 2015 should be extended to cover other companies. "We will expand these reporting obligations to large companies and groups," he said on Thursday. ...

The Art and Science of the Diagram: Communicating the Knowledge of the Heavens, the Earth and the Arcane, Final Part

TOKYO (AP) — Japan's financial markets gyrated wildly Thursday, underscoring the vulnerability of its economy to a loss of investor confidence as Prime Minister Shinzo Abe attempts shock monetary easing to end two decades of stagnation.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Urban renewal? New census estimates show that most of the nation's largest cities further enhanced their allure last year, posting strong population growth for a second straight year.

By Andrea Shalal-Esa WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Public backlash against deadly overseas drone strikes may undermine promising uses of such technology for anything from disaster response to mail delivery, a top U.S. industry group said as it launched a lobbying effort to "demystify" unmanned planes. The Aerospace Industries Association wants to prevent misperceptions and regulatory roadblocks from cutting into a market it says could be worth $89 billion over the next decade, according to a report the trade group will release on Thursday. ...

By Irene Klotz CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - In a scene right out of Star Trek, a Texas company is developing a 3-D food printer for astronauts to create custom meals on the fly. With support from NASA, the firm, Systems and Materials Research Corp of Austin, intends to design, build and test a food printer that can work in space. "This project is to demonstrate we can create and change the nutrition of the food and be able to print it in a low-gravity environment," the company's research director and lead chemist, David Irvin, told Reuters. ...