Samsung Electronics plunged eight percent Tuesday after it called an unprecedented halt to sales of its troubled Galaxy Note 7 handset, while most regional markets struggled to maintain an early energy-fueled rally.

The world's biggest smartphone maker dragged Seoul's KOSPI down 1.2 percent after it told customers to stop using their Galaxy Note 7 devices and called a halt to worldwide sales, as US officials warned the phones could blow up.

Brazil's lower house on Monday approved a proposal to cap public spending increases for 20 years, a key component of new President Michel Temer's economic recovery program.

Turkey and Russia on Monday signed an inter-governmental agreement on realizing the construction of the planned TurkStream gas pipeline to pump Russian gas under Turkish waters in the Black Sea towards Europe.

President Vladimir Putin on Monday said that non-OPEC member Russia was ready to join measures to limit oil production, saying that this was the only way to balance the market after a prolonged period of low prices.

Royal Dutch Shell confirmed Monday that it had signed an initial deal with Iran's National Petrochemical Company, paving the way for its return to the Islamic republic. 

Facebook paid £4.17 million ($5.18 million, 4.63 million euros) in British corporation tax last year, up from just £4,327 in 2014, accounts showed Sunday.

Two U.S.-based academics won the Nobel Economics Prize on Monday for groundbreaking research on contract theory that has helped design insurance policies, executive pay and even prison management.

Saudi Arabia said on Monday it was "not unthinkable" that the price of crude oil could surge to $60 a barrel by the end of the year but warned against drastic production cuts that might shock markets.

Speaking in the opening keynote speech at the World Energy Congress in Istanbul, Saudi Energy Minister Khalid Al-Falih said that whatever the oil price the kingdom was in good shape to implement its reform vision to transform the structure of its crude-based economy by 2030. 

Chinese internet billionaire Jack Ma has bought a stake in cinema legend Steven Spielberg's company, they said, the latest tie-up between China and Hollywood as they seek to make movies for audiences in the Middle Kingdom and beyond.

Alibaba Pictures, a unit of Ma's sprawling e-commerce conglomerate, has taken a minority shareholding in Spielberg's Amblin Partners, a film creation company that includes DreamWorks studios. 

As cities expand, eating up swathes of countryside in the process, agricultural pioneers are finding new ways to grow the fresh produce we need, in containers, empty buildings and any other spare space they can find to create new vertical farms.