Commerzbank, Germany's second biggest lender, said Thursday it planned to pay a dividend for 2015 for the first time since 2008 after business developed favorably in the first three months.

"We have made a successful start into 2015. We are performing well in all the operating segments and ... have considerably improved the revenues," said chief executive Martin Blessing.

National Australia Bank Thursday announced the country's biggest ever rights issue to raise Aus$5.5 billion (U.S.$4.4 billion) while detailing plans to demerge its British banking business.

The country's fourth biggest lender outlined its proposals as it posted a net profit of Aus$3.44 billion in the six months to March 31, a 20.4 percent jump from the previous year.

German engineering giant Siemens said on Thursday that it would slash an additional 4,500 jobs worldwide, on top of 7,800 cuts announced in February as part of an ongoing restructuring plan.

Some 2,200 of the latest job cuts will be in Germany, said the Munich-based firm that employs more than 300,000 people in all.

Following a solid start to the year, signs emerged Wednesday that the 19-country eurozone economy is losing some traction.

While a closely-watched survey indicated that economic activity grew at a steady pace in April, a separate report pointed to a sharp drop in retail sales in March.

Greece made a 200 million euro ($225 million) interest payment to the International Monetary Fund Wednesday, the Greek finance ministry said, the first of two reimbursements Athens must honour by mid-May.

The smaller of the two scheduled payments totaling nearly one billion euros came despite the failure thus far by cash-strapped Greece and its European Union-IMF creditors to reach a deal to unblock 7.2 billion in bailout funds to Athens.

Iran is expected to outline big oil and gas projects at a major industry event Wednesday ahead of a possible nuclear deal that could allow global energy giants to return.

The plans, which have been trailed in the Iranian media, will likely dominate Iran's 20th Oil, Gas, Refining and Petrochemical Fair, a four-day event in Tehran, which opens at 0930 GMT.

New York, a city of exorbitant rents with more and more single residents, is about to get a brand new type of apartment: micro-units, for decades prohibited under zoning regulations.

A first building of 55 prefabricated studios spanning nine stories is due to welcome its first tenants in Manhattan in the fall.

The EU on Tuesday sharply slashed its growth outlook for Greece this year due to its ongoing battle with its international creditors, dampening an otherwise improved outlook for the eurozone.

The Greek economy slumped severely in the first three months of the year, the European Commission said in its Spring forecasts, cutting its overall 2015 growth outlook for Greece to 0.5 percent, a huge reduction from its earlier prediction of 2.5 percent.

Brazil will sell off 269 blocks of oil this year to international operators, albeit none in potentially highly lucrative so-called pre-salt areas lying deep in the Atlantic, a government minister said Monday.

Brazil is setting great store by the eventual exploitation of tens of billions of barrels' worth of pre-salt stocks and whose selloff, originally slated for next year, is now expected to come in about 2017.

Spain has recovered only five percent of 51.3 billion euros ($57.2 billion) of state aid given to the country's banking sector since 2009 to prevent its collapse, the Bank of Spain said on Monday.

A total of 53.55 billion euros were provided to Spain's banking sector via a restructuring fund in the aftermath of the financial crisis, including 2.25 billion euros of contributions from the private sector.