Israel is to supply Jordan with natural gas from its vast Leviathan offshore gas field over a period of 15 years, U.S. giant Noble Energy announced Wednesday.

A source close to the deal said it was worth $15 billion (11.4 billion euros) -- a significant chunk of some $60 billion which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said will come from Israel's offshore gas exports.

On the day that the outlook for the European economy may have just become a little bit brighter following a cease-fire agreement in eastern Ukraine, a closely watched survey shows the extent to which the crisis in the country has weighed on business confidence across the continent.

Financial information company Markit highlighted tensions in Ukraine for a sharp fall in its monthly gauge of business activity for the 18-country eurozone.

Long-term unemployment is becoming entrenched in many countries hit hard by the economic crisis and it will be harder to get these people back to work when recovery takes hold, the OECD warned Wednesday.

"Long-term unemployment has probably peaked in most countries, but it remains a major source of concern," the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development said in its annual report on employment trends.

Australia's economy lost pace in the second quarter of 2014 after a sharp fall in exports saw growth expand by just 0.5 percent following a strong start to the year, data showed Wednesday.

Annual growth was 3.1 percent, figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics said, compared with a year-on-year expansion of 3.5 percent in the first-quarter. Growth came in at to 1.1 percent in the three months to March.

Japan's All Nippon Airways (ANA) and Lufthansa of Germany on Wednesday announced an air cargo tie up as they look to fight off intense competition from budget airlines on passenger routes.

The airlines said they had won regulatory approval for the agreement, which will see them integrate network planning, pricing, sales and handling on all routes between Japan and Europe.

Spain's jobless queue lengthened slightly in August as the summer hiring boom tailed off but the indicator was stronger than a year ago, government figures showed Tuesday.

The number of people in Spain registered as unemployed crept up by some 8,000 to 4.43 million in August compared to 4.42 in July, the figures from the employment ministry showed.

Little more than two years after opening with high hopes of turning around Atlantic City's struggling casino market, Revel will close its doors Tuesday morning.

The 6 a.m. casino shutdown follows the closure of its hotel on Monday.

Goldman Sachs stands to lose money on a multi-million euro loan it made to one of Portugal's largest banks a month before it collapsed, the Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday.

The U.S. investment bank made the $835-million (635-million-euro) loan in July through a Luxembourg financing vehicle it created at a time when Banco Espirito Santo, on the verge of bankruptcy, found it nearly impossible to borrow money directly in capital markets, the newspaper said.

Prices keep rising in Venezuela, economic activity is sputtering and shops struggle to fill their shelves.

But don't ask the central bank how bad things really are: it hasn't published key data in months.

Foreigners who want to buy Alibaba Group shares in the Chinese e-commerce giant's U.S. public offering will need to get comfortable with an unusual business structure.

Alibaba's online and mobile commerce businesses will be controlled by a "variable interest entity," an arrangement meant to allow investors to buy into Internet and other businesses in which Beijing bans or limits foreign ownership.