Qantas agrees to sweetened buyout offer
Melbourne: Australian airline Qantas Airways has agreed to a topped up A$11.1 billion ($8.7 billion) buyout offer led by Macquarie Bank Ltd. and private equity firm Texas Pacific Group. The offer of A$5.60 a share, 10 percent above Qantas's last trade, was unanimously endorsed by the Qantas board after the bidders dropped their demand for a break fee and simplified other conditions, Qantas chairman Margaret Jackson said.

The board had rejected an offer of A$5.50 on Wednesday.

Qantas shares rose 5.5 percent to a record high A$5.37, but remained below the offer price.
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OPEC may not cut oil output
Abuja: OPEC will meet on Thursday to decide on oil output policy this winter. The organization is under pressure from importing nations to stay away from an oil cut that pushes up prices and damages economic growth.

Opec has already reduced production once this year -- by 1.2 million barrels per day, or four percent, in October to halt a 10-week, 25 percent slump in the oil price. Till last week there was no doubt OPEC would further cut output in Abuja. However as oil stays above $60 and consumer nations are on edge, the mood is changing.

The meeting on Thursday will consider two recommendations from OPEC's advisory Ministerial Monitoring Committee: to ensure members adhere fully to October's deal and meet again in January; or to implement a modest 300,000 bpd cut from Jan. 1.

Saudi Arabia's opinion is likely to decide the matter.
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Merck gets victory on Vioxx
New Orleans: Global drugs giant Merck & Co. won a swift victory in the latest federal Vioxx product liability trial which found that the company adequately warned of the heart risks associated with the medicine.

The jury decided that Vioxx was not the primary cause of 51-year-old Anthony Dedrick's 2003 heart attack and that Dedrick's physician had adequate warning from Merck of the Vioxx heart risks.

Merck is facing more than 27,000 lawsuits from people who claim to have been harmed by the arthritis drug that was withdrawn from the market in September of 2004 after a study showed that it doubled the risk of heart attack and stroke in patients taking it for at least 18 months.

Of the Vioxx trials that have reached a jury verdict, Merck has now won seven and lost four.
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