The Irish Venture Capital Association’s VenturePulse survey shows that Irish companies raised €70.8m from venture capital investors in the three months to September 2008, despite the global credit crunch. This compares to funds raised of €75.4m in the same period of 2007 and €53.9m in 2006.

Principal news stories from the Irish Independent, Irish Times, Irish Examiner, Financial Times and New York Times.

Irish Economy: Taoiseach Brian Cowen on Thursday said the present economic circumstances were the toughest facing the country in 100 years. He said “now is the time for us to pull together.”

US financial giants getting injections of federal cash had liabilities to their executives of more than $40 billion for past years’ pay and pensions as of the end of 2007, a Wall Street Journal analysis shows.

Finfacts has achieved record traffic in October 2008 -  - another month dominated by global financial turmoil.

Activist investor William Ackman proposed spinning off the land Target owns under its stores into a separate real estate investment trust.

Markets news on stocks, currencies and oil.

IIB Bank plc has today officially renamed and rebranded its operations in Ireland to KBC Bank Ireland plc. The move by the bank which is 100% owned by Belgian parent KBC Bank NV will see closer alignment of the bank within the group’s global network. KBC Bank Ireland has said that, following a €3.5 billion injection of capital by the Belgian government into its parent bank on Monday, the bank has opted not to sign up to the Irish State banking guarantee scheme.

German car giant Volkswagen, which is Europe’s biggest carmaker, reported strong results today for the first nine months of 2008, despite the slowing global economy and said that its outlook for the full year remains unchanged.

German unemployment fell in in October below 3 million for the first time in 16 years despite the current economic turmoil.