International Monetary Fund | featured news

The International Monetary Fund on Tuesday shaved projections for global economic growth for this year and next to take into account sharp government spending cuts in the United States and the latest struggles of recession-stricken Europe.

The International Monetary Fund will contribute 1 billion euros ($1.29 billion) over three years to the 10 billion euro bailout for Cyprus, IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde said in a statement on Wednesday.

A lawyer for IMF chief Christine Lagarde says French investigators have searched her Paris home today as part of an inquiry into her role in a $400 million arbitration deal in favor of a tycoon. The laywer, Yves Repiquet (eev ruh-PEE-kay), says Lagarde has nothing to hide and he welcomed Wednesday's search as another step in proving her innocence.

The fund said that growth is hardly expected to snap back to pre-crisis levels of 4.5 to 5.5 percent in the coming years.

The International Monetary Fund, at the urging of the United States, shaped recent research to pressure China over its economic policies, according to a study released Wednesday by the fund’s in-house watchdog.

Former International Monetary Fund leader Dominique Strauss-Kahn and a New York City hotel maid have signed a settlement of her sexual-assault lawsuit.

Over the course of five days, the Greek government -- led by the understated conservative Prime Minister Antonis Samaras -- overcame two high hurdles in a dash to qualify for the austerity program set out by the so-called troika, made up of the European Central Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the European Commission.

The question is whether that’s 10 years from now, or 10 years from 2008, which means we have six more years until the world economy truly recovers from the 2008 housing and derivatives bubble that first exploded in the Manhattan offices of Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers. That’s the view of International Monetary Fund chief economist Oliver Blanchard.

Spain has for the first time conceded it might need a full EU/IMF bailout worth 300 billion euros ($366 billion) if its borrowing costs remain unsustainably high, a euro zone official said.

Turkey and Poland will for the first time hold seats on the International Monetary Fund's executive board under a political agreement reached in recent weeks.