Wall Street ticks lower on “fiscal cliff” stalemate

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Stocks edged slightly lower on Thursday as investors fretted that a deal on the U.S. budget wouldn’t come as soon as they had hoped after President Barack Obama threatened to veto a controversial Republican plan.

The market barely reacted to a round of strong data, including on gross domestic product growth and housing, suggesting talks to avert the “fiscal cliff,” steep tax hikes and spending cuts due to take effect in 2013, remain the primary focus for markets.

Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner said Wednesday his chamber would pass a proposal that spares many wealthy Americans from tax hikes needed to balance the budget. Obama has threatened to veto the plan if it passes, while some Republicans oppose any deal featuring tax increases.

“The closer we get to the end of the year without a deal, the more optimism is going to evaporate,” said Todd Schoenberger, managing partner at LandColt Capital in New York. “Volatility is going to be extreme until there’s a deal, and the probability of being caught on the downside is much greater than being on the upside.”

While investors have hoped for an agreement soon between policy makers over the fiscal cliff, this seems unlikely as wrangling continues over the details.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> was down 18.74 points, or 0.14 percent, at 13,233.23. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index <.spx> was down 0.84 points, or 0.06 percent, at 1,434.97. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> was down 4.18 points, or 0.14 percent, at 3,040.18.</.ixic></.spx></.dji>

NYSE Euronext was the S&P 500′s top percentage gainer, surging 35 percent to $ 32.56 after IntercontinentalExchange Inc said it would buy the operator of the New York Stock Exchange for $ 8.2 billion. ICE shares rose 1.3 percent to $ 130.06.

Stocks rallied earlier in the week on signs of progress in the negotiations, led by banking and energy shares, which tend to outperform in times of economic expansion. On signs of complications, however, many have turned to hedging their bets through options and exchange-traded funds.

The U.S. economy grew 3.1 percent in the third quarter, faster than previously estimated, while the number of Americans filing new claims for jobless benefits rose more than expected in the latest week.

“It is great to see this kind of growth, but investors know it could all disappear if there’s no deal on the cliff,” Schoenberger said. “Macro data may be on the back burner for a while.”

Existing home sales jumped 5.9 percent in November, more than expected, and by the fastest monthly place in three years. And the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia’s December index of business conditions in the U.S. Mid-Atlantic region rose to 8.1 from -10.7 in November. Analysts were looking for a read of -3.

Google Inc agreed to sell set-top TV box maker Motorola Home to Arris Group Inc for $ 2.35 billion in cash and stock. Arris rose 6.6 percent to $ 15.51 while Google was little changed.

(Editing by Bernadette Baum)

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State Department security chief leaves post over Benghazi

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. State Department said on Wednesday its security chief had resigned from his post and three other officials had been relieved of their duties following a scathing official inquiry into the September 11 attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi.

Eric Boswell has resigned effective immediately as assistant secretary of state for diplomatic security, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said in a terse statement. A second official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Boswell had not left the department entirely and remained a career official.

Nuland said that Boswell, and the three other officials, had all been put on administrative leave “pending further action.”

An official panel that investigated the incident concluded that the Benghazi mission was completely unprepared to deal with the attack, which killed U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans.

The unclassified version of the report, which was released on Tuesday, cited “leadership and management” deficiencies, poor coordination among officials and “real confusion” in Washington and in the field over who had the authority to make decisions on policy and security concerns.

“The ARB identified the performance of four officials, three in the Bureau of the Diplomatic Security and one in the Bureau of (Near Eastern) Affairs,” Nuland said in her statement, referring to the panel known as an Accountability Review Board.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton accepted Boswell’s decision to resign effective immediately, the spokeswoman said.

Earlier, a U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity said Boswell, one of his deputies, Charlene Lamb, and a third unnamed official has been asked to resign. The Associated Press first reported that three officials had resigned.

PANEL STOPS SHORT OF BLAMING CLINTON

The Benghazi incident appeared likely to tarnish Clinton’s four-year tenure as secretary of state but the report did not fault her specifically and the officials who led the review stopped short of blaming her.

“We did conclude that certain State Department bureau-level senior officials in critical positions of authority and responsibility in Washington demonstrated a lack of leadership and management ability appropriate for senior ranks,” retired Admiral Michael Mullen, one of the leaders of the inquiry, told reporters on Wednesday.

The panel’s chair, retired Ambassador Thomas Pickering, said it had determined that responsibility for security shortcomings in Benghazi belonged at levels lower than Clinton’s office.

“We fixed (responsibility) at the assistant secretary level, which is, in our view, the appropriate place to look for where the decision-making in fact takes place, where – if you like – the rubber hits the road,” Pickering said after closed-door meetings with congressional committees.

The panel’s report and the comments by its two lead authors suggested that Clinton, who accepted responsibility for the incident in a television interview about a month after the Benghazi attack, would not be held personally culpable.

Pickering and Mullen spoke to the media after briefing members of the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee and Senate Foreign Relations Committee behind closed doors on classified elements of their report.

Clinton had been expected to appear at an open hearing on Benghazi on Thursday, but is recuperating after suffering a concussion, dehydration and a stomach bug last week. She will instead be represented by her two top deputies.

Clinton, who intends to step down in January, said in a letter accompanying the review that she would adopt all of its recommendations, which include stepping up security staffing and requesting more money to fortify U.S. facilities.

The National Defense Authorization Act for 2013, which is expected to go to Congress for final approval this week, includes a measure directing the Pentagon to increase the Marine Corps presence at diplomatic facilities by up to 1,000 Marines.

Some Capitol Hill Republicans who had criticized the Obama administration’s handling of the Benghazi attacks said they were impressed by the report.

“It was very thorough,” said Senator Johnny Isakson. Senator John Barrasso said: “It was very, very critical of major failures at the State Department at very high levels.” Both spoke after the closed-door briefing.

Others, however, took a harsher line and called for Clinton to testify as soon as she is able.

“The report makes clear the massive failure of the State Department at all levels, including senior leadership, to take action to protect our government employees abroad,” Representative Mike Rogers, the Republican chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said in a statement.

Senator Bob Corker, who will be the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee when the new Congress is seated early next year, said Clinton should testify about Benghazi before her replacement is confirmed by the Senate.

Republicans have focused much of their firepower on U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, who appeared on TV talk shows after the attack and suggested it was the result of a spontaneous protest rather than a premeditated attack.

The report concluded that there was no such protest.

Rice, widely seen as President Barack Obama’s top pick to succeed Clinton, withdrew her name from consideration last week.

(Additional reporting by Tabassum Zakaria and Susan Cornwell; Editing by Christopher Wilson)

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Facebook predicted to overtake Google in mobile display ad revenue this year

Shares of Facebook (FB) have begun to rebound since the company’s disastrous initial public offering this past May. After opening at $ 38 per share the company’s stock plummeted into the mid-20s over the summer months and eventually fell to a low of $ 17.55 in early September. Since then, however, Facebook shares have begun to bounce back after the company posted better-than-expected results in the third quarter. While Facebook stock is still down more than 25% on the year, it is rising steadily as analysts and investors become increasingly bullish about the company’s future as a leading advertising platform.

[More from BGR: BlackBerry 10 browser smokes iOS 6 and Windows Phone 8 in comparison test [video]]

According to a new report from eMarketer, Facebook is predicted to surpass Google (GOOG) in mobile display advertising in 2012. Google is expected to generate $ 339 million in mobile ad revenue this year, a significant increase from previous estimates of between $ 45 and $ 100 million. The research firm notes that Facebook is expected to capture an 18.4% share of the mobile display ad market in the U.S. this year, compared to Google’s 17% share, which is down from 23% in 2011.

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“Major ad publishers are strengthening their offerings much faster than previously expected,” said Clark Fredricksen, vice president of communications at eMarketer. “I don’t think anybody thought after the second quarter that Google and Facebook would be in position that they are now in the mobile ad marketplace.”

The company’s mobile ad revenue is expected to more than triple by 2014 when it will reach an estimated $ 1.2 billion. The firm predicts that Facebook and Google will continue to battle for the No.1 spot in the mobile ad market over the next few years. Facebook is expected to increase its lead to 25.2% in 2013, compared to Google’s 19.6% share. Google is estimated to bounce back in 2014, however, with a market leading 23.1% share, ahead of Facebook’s 22.7% share.

Despite the impressive numbers, eMarketer notes that mobile still represents a small slice of the total advertising market. In 2012, only 2.4% of total ad spending in the U.S. is expected to go towards mobile ads, but the market is expected to reach an 11% share by 2016 when it surpasses both radio and print spending.

This article was originally published by BGR

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Thousands mourn U.S.-Mexican singer Jenni Rivera

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Thousands of mourners on Wednesday packed a Los Angeles theater to pay their final respects to Mexican-American singer Jenni Rivera more than a week after her death in a plane crash.

Rivera, 43, best known for her work in the Mexican folk Nortena and Banda genres, died after the small jet she was traveling in crashed in northern Mexico on December 9.

Rivera’s family, dressed in white, led the memorial service eulogizing the singer. A bank of white roses was displayed in front of Rivera’s bright red coffin and a brass band performed musical interludes.

More than 6,000 people crowded into the theater about 30 miles north of her childhood home in Long Beach, California. Tickets for the service at the Gibson Amphitheatre sold out within minutes, organizers said.

The daughter of Mexican immigrants, Rivera was called the “Diva de la Banda.” She sold about 15 million albums and earned a slew of Latin Grammy nominations during her 17-year career.

“Jenni made it OK for women to be who they are,” her manager Pete Salgado said at the service. “Jenni also made it OK to be from nothing, with the hopes of being something.”

Rivera had five children, the first at age 15, and was married three times. Her third husband was baseball pitcher Esteban Loaiza. Rivera’s private life influenced her songs, which often referenced living through hardship.

“She’s a fighter and she knows it’s in all of us,” Rivera’s son Michael said between video tributes.

In recent years, Rivera branched out into television, appearing on a reality television show and serving as a judge on the Mexican version of the singing competition “The Voice.” Television broadcaster ABC was reported to be developing a comedy pilot for the singer.

Rivera’s plane crashed in mountains south of Monterrey killing all seven on board.

The singer was to perform in the city of Toluca, 40 miles southwest of Mexico City, in central Mexico after a concert in Monterrey. It is not clear what caused the crash.

(Reporting by Eric Kelsey; Editing by Stacey Joyce)

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Texas governor asks cancer agency to halt grants

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — A $ 3 billion cancer-fighting effort that’s already under criminal investigation received yet more humiliation Wednesday when Texas Gov. Rick Perry called for a moratorium on new grants until confidence is restored in a once-celebrated agency that has plunged into turmoil in just three years.

Leaders of the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas quickly embraced the request from Perry, who unveiled the unprecedented state-run cancer fight in 2009 with promises of medical breakthroughs. But the effort has unraveled into one of Texas‘ biggest tempests involving a state agency in Perry’s 12 years as governor.

A key Republican lawmaker who filed the original bill creating CPRIT piled on Wednesday by introducing new legislation, this time calling for new polices to bolster agency oversight and accountability. The agency also faces another round of scrutiny Thursday in front of a key state budget-writing committee.

“The mission of defeating cancer is too important to be derailed by inadequate processes and a lack of oversight,” Perry said in a letter to CPRIT’s oversight committee. That panel includes members appointed by Perry and some of his top political donors.

The governor added, “It is important that we restore the confidence of the Texas taxpayers who approved this important initiative before new funds are dispersed.”

The letter was co-signed by Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst and state House Speaker Joe Straus, who also appoints members of the agency’s governing board.

CPRIT controls the nation’s second-largest pot of cancer research dollars, behind the National Institutes of Health. That federal department’s cancer-research arm, the National Cancer Institute, also has said it is reviewing the troubles surrounding the Texas agency.

NCI confers on CPRIT prestigious status as an approved funding entity and losing that designation would be another blow for the beleaguered agency. It’s already under a criminal investigation, is the target of widespread rebuke from scientists and has seen its leadership purged by resignations, including its executive director last week.

In a statement, oversight committee Chairman Jimmy Mansour and Vice Chairman Joseph Bailes said they agreed with Perry’s call to cooperate with current reviews, implement recommended changes, enact reforms and fill key positions.

“These issues need to be resolved to restore public confidence in CPRIT,” they said in a joint statement.

The reviews began after CPRIT disclosed that an $ 11 million grant to a private company had bypassed review.

The award to Dallas-based Peloton Therapeutics, a biomedical startup, marked the second time this year that a lucrative taxpayer-funded grant authorized by CPRIT instigated backlash and raised questions about oversight.

The first involved a $ 20 million grant to M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston that CPRIT’s former chief science officer, Nobel laureate Dr. Alfred Gilman, described as a thin proposal that should have first been scrutinized by an outside panel of scientific peer-reviewers, even though none was required under the agency’s rules.

Dozens of the nation’s top scientists agreed. They resigned en masse from the agency’s peer-review panels along with Gilman. Some accused the agency of “hucksterism” and charting a politically-driven path that was putting commercial product-development above science.

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UBS in $1.5bn Libor rigging fine

19 December 2012 Last updated at 06:43 ET

Swiss banking giant UBS has agreed to pay $ 1.5bn (£940m) to US, UK and Swiss regulators for attempting to manipulate the Libor inter-bank lending rate.

It becomes the second major bank to be fined over Libor after Barclays was ordered to pay $ 450m to UK and US authorities in the summer.

Regulators worldwide are investigating a number of banks for rigging Libor.

Libor tracks the average rate at which the major international banks based in London lend money to each other.

The bank also admitted to manipulating Euribor and Tibor – the equivalent interest rates set by lenders in the eurozone and in Tokyo.

UBS said it had agreed to pay fines to regulators in three different countries:

It is the second-largest set of fines imposed on a bank to date, after the $ 1.9bn that HSBC agreed to pay US authorities earlier this month to settle allegations of money-laundering.

Continue reading the main story

“Start Quote

The potential costs to [the banks] could be eye-watering if clients can prove they are out of pocket as a result of market rigging”

End Quote

The fine “demonstrates the co-ordinated approach regulators are now taking to serious conduct issues that affect jurisdictions internationally,” said Nick Matthews, a forensic accountant at consultancy Kinetic Partners.

The bank has also agreed to admit to committing wire fraud through its Tokyo office in the case of manipulating Libor rates for loans denominated in Japanese yen, among others.

It said it would seek a non-prosecution agreement with the DoJ covering the rest of the bank’s misbehaviour.

The fine is the latest blow for UBS, following the conviction of rogue trader Kweku Adoboli earlier this year for losing £1.4bn for the bank, a £500m settlement with US authorities for helping US citizens evade taxes.

UBS also suffered the worst losses of any bank from US sub-prime mortgages during the financial crisis, totalling 38bn, and necessitating a bailout from the Swiss authorities.

The bank still faces lawsuits in the US for mis-selling mortgage debt to other investors, including a $ 6.4bn claim by the US government-sponsored mortgage finance agencies Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.

Trader collusion

UBS said the fines – along with other payouts for mis-selling mortgage debts in the US – were likely to result in the bank recording a loss of 2bn-2.5bn Swiss francs in its financial accounts for the last three months of the year, although it still expects to make a profit for the year as a whole.

Continue reading the main story

What is Libor?

• Libor is the “London Inter-Bank Offered Rate”


• It tracks the average interest rate at which the big international banks based in London are willing to lend to each other


• The Libor rate is used to calculate payments under hundreds of trillions of dollars-worth of financial contracts, including mortgages and loans


• Libor is set every day by the British Bankers’ Association, based on estimates submitted by a panel of a dozen or so banks of their borrowing costs


• Banks are accused of lying about their real borrowing costs, in order to manipulate Libor for profit, and to make themselves look stronger during the financial crisis

The Swiss lender acknowledged its staff had manipulated the borrowing rates it submitted, which were then used to calculate the Libor rate – a benchmark interest rate that is used to calculate the payments on hundreds of trillions of dollars-worth of financial contracts – in order to make money on their trades.

According to the FSA, UBS had even gone so far as to give its traders formal responsibility for handling the bank’s submissions to the Libor-setting committee at the British Bankers’ Association – creating a direct conflict of interest, as the traders could profit depending on what they submitted.

Significantly, UBS also said its traders had colluded with their counterparts at other banks and brokerages.

The FSA said that UBS’s Tokyo office had made corrupt payments to brokerages – which helped to bring borrowers and lenders together anonymously in the inter-bank lending market – in order to enlist their support in manipulating Libor.

Besides UBS and Barclays, about a dozen other major banks are involved in setting Libor rates each day across a range of currencies, and most of them are understood to be still under investigation.

UBS chairman Axel Weber said: “The authorities have recognized UBS for the thoroughness of our investigation and our exceptional co-operation.”

According to the FSA, it would have fined UBS £200m, but gave the bank a 20% discount because it co-operated. Nonetheless, the £160m fine was still the largest ever imposed by the UK authority.

Barclays – which was the first bank to come clean over the scandal – has previously indicated that its fine of $ 450m would be overshadowed by the fines to be imposed on other culpable banks.

‘Not pretty reading’

Like Barclays, UBS also accepted that management had also told staff to submit inappropriately low estimated borrowing costs for the bank during the financial crisis, in order to give a false impression of the bank’s ability to borrow cheaply and maintain market confidence in the bank.

“We deeply regret this inappropriate and unethical behaviour,” said UBS chief executive Sergio Ermotti.

“No amount of profit is more important than the reputation of this firm, and we are committed to doing business with integrity.”

Former Schroders group managing director Philip Augar told BBC News that disadvantaged customers could take action against banks

The FSA said that the misconduct at UBS was extensive and widespread and involved at least 45 individuals.

“At least 2,000 requests for inappropriate submissions were documented – an unquantifiable number of oral requests, which by their nature would not be documented, were also made,” the FSA said.

“Manipulation was also discussed in internal open chat forums and group emails, and was widely known.”

It was so common that the FSA said every single Libor submission by UBS during the period it examined, from 2005 to 2010, may have been tainted.

“The findings we have set out in our notice today do not make for pretty reading,” said the FSA’s head of enforcement, Tracy McDermott.

Despite this, five separate internal audits by the bank’s compliance department failed to pick up on the misbehaviour.

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Canada serial killer inquiry finds “systemic bias” by police

(Reuters) – Police made critical errors in pursuing Canadian serial killer Robert Pickton partly because of “systemic bias” against his victims, sex trade workers from a rough Vancouver neighborhood, according to the final report from a public inquiry released on Monday.

Commissioner Wally Oppal was asked by the British Columbia government to investigate, in effect, why Pickton was not caught sooner. Women disappeared from the Downtown Eastside neighborhood for more than a decade before the pig farmer’s 2002 arrest.

“The investigations of missing and murdered women were characterized by blatant police failures, and by public indifference,” Oppal said at a press conference in Vancouver that was frequently interrupted by protesters.

Pickton was convicted of six murders, but prosecutors believe he killed many more – 20 other charges were stayed after he received the maximum possible sentence.

Oppal outlined a string of police errors, from failing to take proper reports when women went missing and communicate adequately with families, to ineffective coordination across jurisdictions. He called his more than 1,200-page report, which is based on eight months of hearings, “Forsaken”.

“After reviewing the evidence of the investigations, I have come to the conclusion that there was systemic bias by the police,” he said.

Oppal recommended that the provincial government establish a compensation fund for the children of the victims and consider creating a regional police force for Vancouver, instead of the patchwork of jurisdictions currently in place.

After Oppal’s announcement, B.C. Minister of Justice Shirley Bond wiped away tears as she spoke to victims’ families.

“I want you to know that, however inadequate these words sound, we are sorry for your loss,” she said. “We will work hard to prevent these circumstances from being repeated in our province.”

She announced the appointment of a former lieutenant governor, Steven Point, to serve as the report’s “champion”, guiding implementation. Bond said the government would immediately give new funding to WISH, a drop-in center for women who work in the Downtown Eastside’s sex trade.

POLICE RESPOND

The Vancouver Police Department said in a short statement that it is committed to learning from its mistakes and will study the report.

“We know that nothing can ever truly heal the wounds of grief and loss but if we can, we want to assure the families that the Vancouver Police Department deeply regrets anything we did that may have delayed the eventual solving of these murders,” it said.

Deputy Commissioner Craig Callens, who commands the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in British Columbia, said in a statement that his force will review the report.

Oppal said many individual police officers were diligent, and he commended several by name. But he said that as a system, the authorities failed because of bias against Pickton’s victims, many of whom were poor and addicted to drugs.

“Would the reaction of the police and the public have been any different if the missing women had come from Vancouver’s (more affluent) west side? The answer is obvious,” he said.

Aboriginal women were overrepresented among the victims, and Oppal repeatedly referred to the broader “marginalization” of aboriginal people in Canada.

“There has to be community responsibility for what has taken place,” he said, highlighting poverty and the conditions on the Downtown Eastside. “The social reality is that racism and gender bias are prevalent within Canadian society, and we must do something to eradicate those.”

Victims’ families and activists were on hand for Oppal’s press conference, and he stopped speaking several times as audience members shouted criticism, chanted and played drums.

The provincial government did not offer funding to a number of community organizations that said they needed support to participate in the lengthy and complex inquiry. In protest, other groups boycotted the process.

In November, several organizations, including the B.C. Civil Liberties Association, released their own report, criticizing the inquiry for, among other things, excluding too many aboriginal women, sex trade workers and drug users.

Bond, the justice minister, said she did not regret the decision not to fund those groups, but said she saw them participating in the future. “I think going forward this is room for us to include other voices.” (Reporting by Allison Martell; Editing by Eric Beech)

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Facebook CEO Zuckerberg donating $500M in stock

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said he is donating nearly $ 500 million in stock to a Silicon Valley charity with the aim of funding health and education issues.

Zuckerberg donated 18 million Facebook shares, valued at $ 498.8 million based on their Tuesday closing price. The beneficiary is the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, a nonprofit that works with donors to allocate their gifts.

This is Zuckerberg’s largest donation to date. He pledged $ 100 million in Facebook stock to Newark, N.J., public schools in 2010, before his company went public earlier this year. Later in 2010, he joined Giving Pledge, an effort led by Microsoft Corp. founder Bill Gates and Berkshire Hathaway Inc. CEO Warren Buffett to get the country’s richest people to donate most of their wealth. His wife, Priscilla Chan, joined with him.

In a Facebook post Tuesday, Zuckerberg, 28, said he’s “proud of the work” done by the foundation that his Newark donation launched, called Startup: Education, which has helped open charter schools, high schools and others.

With the latest contribution, he added, “we will look for areas in education and health to focus on next.” He did not give further details on what plans there may be for funds.

“Mark’s generous gift will change lives and inspire others in Silicon Valley and around the globe to give back and make the world a better place,” said Emmett D. Carson, CEO of the foundation.

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“Best Funeral Ever” premiere delayed after Newtown school shootings

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – Fans of death-centric reality TV will have to wait a little longer to dig into TLC‘s “Best Funeral Ever.”

TLC has pushed back the premiere of the special to January 6 at 10/9c in light of the school shootings in Newtown, Conn. last week.

“Best Funeral Ever” was initially scheduled to premiere on December 26 at 8/7c.

“Best Funeral Ever” centers around the Golden Gate Funeral Home in Dallas, which specializes in elaborate specialty funerals catering to the deceased’s interest. In the special, a doo-wop singer famous for his rib-sauce jingle receives a barbecue-themed sendoff, while a disabled man who was unable to ride roller coasters in mortal life receives a State Fair-themed funeral.

Since last Friday’s horrific shootings, a number of programs and other entertainment-related events have been moved out of sensitivity. Syfy, for one, decided not to air its scheduled episode of “Haven” on Friday night, because it contained elements of fictionalized school violence.

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Russia fund in consortium to back U.S. pharma firms

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian state technology firm Rusnano, alongside a group of investors, is investing $ 93 million in three U.S.-based pharmaceutical firms to develop drugs to treat illnesses such as epilepsy, the investors said on Wednesday.

Rusnano is making the investment with U.S. venture capital fund Domain Associates and other investors. Rusnano partnered with Domain in March with plans to invest around $ 760 million in U.S. healthcare and pharmaceutical firms to bring new drugs to the Russian market.

The three companies receiving investments – Marinus Pharmaceuticals, Lithera and Regado Biosciences – are portfolio companies of Domain and the investments will be used to register medications and undertake further clinical trials in the U.S. and Russia, the companies said.

Marinus is developing a drug for the treatment of epilepsy, Lithera works on products for aesthetic medicine and ophthalmology and Regado is developing antithrombotic products.

(Reporting by Megan Davies; Editing by Douglas Busvine)

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