Business - Nation / World

Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom said Thursday he was "in tears" after a European company deleted all the data it was hosting from his shuttered file-sharing site.

The Federal Reserve's chief policymaking group, the Federal Open Market Committee, has vast power over the economy through its ability to set monetary policy.

The Federal Reserve has taken many unprecedented steps in the past four years to try to boost the U.S. economy and counter the effects of a financial crisis that triggered a painful recession. It has kept the short-term interest rate it controls at a record low near zero since December 2008.

The Federal Reserve is likely to begin tapering off its economic life support late this year and finish a controversial program of bond purchases by the middle of the next year, Chairman Ben Bernanke said Wednesday in remarks that triggered fear and loathing in financial markets.

Stratasys, a leading maker of 3-D printers, is buying another 3-D printer manufacturer, MakerBot, for $403 million in stock.

On July 1, we say goodbye to Google Reader, a handy tool for bringing headlines and articles from your favorite websites into a single place.

THE NEWS: Men's Wearhouse Inc. says Wednesday it dismissed its founder and executive chairman George Zimmer, who appeared in many of its TV commercials with the slogan, "You're going to like the way you look. I guarantee it."

Microsoft rolled back a much-criticized requirement that its upcoming Xbox One gaming console be regularly connected to the Internet and made clear that there will be no limitations on sharing games.

Red Hat Inc., the company behind the Linux open-source operating system, said Wednesday that net income in its fiscal first-quarter grew 8 percent as subscription revenue increased.

EASING BACK: Stocks slid and bond yields rose sharply after Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said the central bank could start to pull back on its bond purchases later this year if the economy improves enough, and end the program by mid-2014.