* A group of hackers in China breached the computer defenses of America's top business-lobbying group and gained access to everything stored on its systems, including information about its three million members.

* House Republicans dug in for a year-end standoff, scuttling a temporary extension to a payroll-tax break.

* The European Union is facing austerity measures, political turmoil and financial uncertainty. The Journal spoke with families in six Euro Zone countries to hear first-hand the dinner conversations shaped by the crisis.

* Investigators on the hunt for missing customer money from MF Global are scrutinizing about $200 million moved to a company account at J.P. Morgan Chase.

* Microsoft and Nokia in recent months flirted with the idea of making a joint bid for Research In Motion. The talks underscore the severity of the challenges facing RIM.

* Honda plans to shift a major chunk of its manufacturing to North America over the next two years to combat a strengthening yen that has made Japanese-built cars too expensive to export around the world.

* Activist fund Starboard Value has trained its guns on AOL , arguing that the Internet company's strategy of investing in Web content businesses isn't paying off for investors.

* Asian stock markets rose sharply Wednesday, with exporters advancing as upbeat U.S. housing data and a successful Spanish debt auction overcame the recent drumbeat of bad news from Europe.

* The biggest U.S. banks will be required to limit their financial ties to one another under new proposed rules aimed at preventing the collapse of one big institution from triggering a larger, cascading crisis.

* Olympus Corp. has hired SMBC Nikko Securities Inc. and Citigroup Inc. to help it raise fresh capital to restore its battered financial health, people familiar with the matter said Tuesday.

* European officials, to the anger of foreign air carriers, have set up a controversial program to reduce carbon-dioxide emissions from the world's jetliners. United Parcel Service Inc. already has a plan to sidestep it-which will probably end up creating more carbon.

* Oracle Corp., one of the technology industry's bellwethers, sent unsettling signals Tuesday that economic uncertainty is hurting corporate demand for high-tech products.

* Two pharmaceutical giants suffered big product setbacks Tuesday, as AstraZeneca PLC said it would take a $380 million charge to discontinue development of experimental drugs for depression and cancer, and Novartis AG said potential safety problems are likely to undermine sales of the hypertension pill Tekturna.

• A Permanent Economic Emergency