The Fitch ratings agency on Friday revised its outlook for Russia to negative from stable after the United States slapped new sanctions against Russian officials amid the Ukraine crisis.

"The revision of the outlook to negative reflects the potential impact of sanctions on Russia's economy and business environment," Fitch said in a statement.

European leaders were on Thursday to debate biting economic sanctions against Russia for its annexation of Crimea as Ukraine tore up key ties with the Kremlin and drew up plans to evacuate its nationals from the rebel peninsula.

The European Union is under intense pressure to find a credible response to an explosive security crisis on the 28-nation bloc's eastern frontier that NATO chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen on Wednesday called "the gravest threat to European security and stability since the end of the Cold War."

Deutsche Bank, Germany's largest lender, said on Thursday that it was revising down its 2013 earnings to reflect the recent settlement of a long-running legal dispute.

Deutsche Bank said in a statement that net profit amounted to 681 million euros ($942 million) in 2013, rather than the 1.08 billion euros originally reported in January.

Toyota admitted that it hid information about defects that caused Toyota and Lexus vehicles to accelerate unexpectedly causing injuries and deaths and agreed to pay a record $1.2 billion to settle an investigation by the U.S. government.

Attorney General Eric Holder said Wednesday that the penalty is the largest of its kind ever imposed on an auto company. The four-year criminal investigation focused on whether Toyota promptly reported the problems related to unintended acceleration.

Japan on Thursday passed its biggest-ever budget, a $937 billion spending package aimed at propping up growth as consumers brace for the country's first sales tax hike in over 15 years.

A total of 136 lawmakers in the 242-member upper house, controlled by the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, voted for the package, against 102 opposition votes, a parliamentary spokesman said. Two lawmakers did not cast a vote, one seat is vacant and the house speaker only casts a ballot in a tie.

Hundreds of Taiwanese activists were locked in a tense standoff with police Wednesday after they stormed parliament to try to stop the government ratifying a contentious trade agreement with China.

Around 200 protesters -- mostly young students -- broke through security barriers and took over parliament's main chamber on Tuesday night, the first such occupation of the building in the island's history.

Britain announced Wednesday it was ditching the £1 coin it has used for the past three decades and replacing it with a 12-sided piece that will be harder to fake.

The Treasury says the new coin, made of two metals in two different colors and modeled on the old Threepenny bit, will be "the most secure coin in circulation in the world".

Porsche, the German maker of luxury sports cars, said Wednesday it is recalling all 911 GT3 models built this year due to risk of possible engine fire.

Porsche said in a statement that it will replace the engines of all 785 of the high-priced 911 GT3 sports cars built in 2014.

There's London. And then there's the rest of the U.K.

A tale of two Britains has increasingly emerged since the Great Recession. While the government trumpets the country's recovery from the financial crisis and its status as the world's fastest-growing developed economy, the rhetoric hides an increasing divide: One that pits London's boom against the malaise in cities such as Manchester and Birmingham that are struggling to remain vibrant in the 21st century.

Syria has suffered damage estimated at $31 billion as a result of its three-year civil war, Prime Minister Wael al-Halqi has said, a figure nearly equivalent to its GDP.

"The damage caused by the war in Syria stands at 4.7 trillion Syrian pounds," or $31.3 billion dollars (22.5 billion euros), Halqi told the ruling party's Al-Baath newspaper.