European stock markets advanced solidly Wednesday as Wall Street set new all-time highs, although Madrid lagged after Spain threatened to suspend Catalonia's autonomy.

The Tokyo stock market might be riding two-decade highs, but a growing number of Japanese are choosing to stash their cash in the humble home safe, wary of negative interest rates in the bank and out of the view of eagle-eyed tax officials.

It's the prize of a lifetime -- a $5 billion investment creating 50,000 well-paid jobs that everyone wants, but only one US city will get.

Tourism activity in Catalonia, Spain's most visited region, has dropped by around 15 percent since a contested independence referendum on October 1 that was marred by violence, an industry lobby group said Tuesday.

Reversing Britain's shock referendum to leave the EU would "significantly" boost the economy, the OECD said on Tuesday, while the government insisted there were no plans to cancel Brexit.

Britain's annual inflation rate accelerated in September to the highest level in more than five years, lifted by rising commodity, food and transport prices, official data showed Tuesday.

China's economic growth likely eased in the third quarter but is on course to beat the government's annual forecasts, analysts say, providing a boon for the Communist Party as it prepares to hand Xi Jinping a second term as president.

The European Central Bank expects a pickup in inflation even though wages have remained weak during the current economic recovery, its vice president, Vitor Constancio, has said.

Constancio was joined in Washington by other central bank leaders, who likewise said they expected inflation to rise at some point despite its perplexing weakness across advanced economies.

Faced with dire economic straits due to low oil prices, Saudi Arabia is gearing up for deeper production cuts ahead of its massive Aramco share offering.

Israeli officials have announced they will temporarily expand the fishing area for Palestinians off a sector of the blockaded Gaza Strip.