The Traderszone Network

When it comes to food stamps, Maine’s tea-party governor has nanny-state ambitions.

According to a complaint filed Tuesday night in a New York state court in Manhattan, Citigroup breached its duties as trustee for the 25 private-label trusts dating from 2004 to 2007 by ignoring “pervasive and systemic deficiencies” in how the underlying loans were underwritten or being serviced. The investors said Citigroup looked askance at the loans’ “abysmal performance” out of fear it might “jeopardize its close business relationships” with loan servicers including Wells Fargo & Co and JPMorgan Chase & Co, or prompt them to retaliate over its own problem loans.

General Motors Co (GM.N) and its law firm need not turn over privileged documents to drivers hoping to show that the automaker intended to commit a crime or fraud by concealing defective ignition switches in their vehicles, a Manhattan federal judge ruled on Wednesday. Despite finding “probable cause” to believe GM committed a crime or fraud by hiding the defect from regulators and the public, U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman found no showing that the automaker and King & Spalding produced the documents with an intent to further such misconduct.

The Federal Reserve said on Wednesday that bigger U.S. banks would have an extra year to calculate a capital requirement known as the supplementary leverage ratio for stress testing. Institutions subjected to the leverage ratio requirement will have to show regulators what the ratio would be in a stressed scenario beginning in 2017. The extension applies to banks with more than $50 billion of assets, of which there were 39 at the end of the third quarter, according to data from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.

NXP Semiconductors N.V. has won U.S. antitrust approval to buy Freescale Semiconductor Ltd, a deal worth $11.8 billion, on condition that it sell its radio frequency power business, the Federal Trade Commission said on Wednesday. European Union antitrust regulators approved the deal in September with the same condition.

Shares of the maker of John Deere tractors were up 4 percent at $79.40 in afternoon trading. Deere expects total equipment sales to drop about 11 percent in its first quarter, which began on Nov. 1, and fall about 7 percent for the year. Deere also forecast net income attributable to the company at about $1.4 billion for fiscal 2016, down from $1.94 billion in 2015.

Intel is increasing investments in growth markets, while reducing investments in less-attractive areas.