General Motors and Ford saw their U.S. sales skid in April as rivals Chrysler, Toyota and Volkswagen posted strong gains, industry data showed Tuesday.

Total industry sales rose 2.3 percent from a year ago, while the sales pace was unchanged from March at a seasonally adjusted, annualized rate of 14.4 million vehicles, according to Autodata.

Etihad Airways, the United Arab Emirates carrier said Tuesday it has acquired a 2.987 per cent stake in Irish airline Aer Lingus.

Etihad said the "purchase reflected its desire to forge a commercial partnership with the Irish national carrier," adding that "a possible partnership could produce significant commercial benefits for both airlines."

Australia's Woodside Petroleum on Tuesday said it had sold a minority stake in its proposed Browse gas export project to a Japanese consortium for U.S. $2 billion.

Woodside is the major equity holder and operator of the Browse LNG Development in Western Australia and offloaded a 14.7 percent interest to Japan Australia LNG, a joint venture of the Mitsui and Mitsubishi trading houses.

Coca-Cola, the world's largest beverage company, on Monday denied media reports it was in talks to buy energy-drink giant Monster Beverage.

"At this time, we are not in discussions to acquire the Monster Beverage Corporation, Coke said in a statement.

U.S. aircraft leasing firm Air Lease said Monday it has bought eight new Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner aircraft to lease to Vietnam Airlines.

Financial details of the purchase were not revealed. The catalog value of the planes is $1.8 billion.

German sportswear maker Adidas reported Monday a strong rise in first-quarter profits but warned full-year earnings would be hit by the discovery of irregularities in its Indian business.

Adidas reported a net profit of 289 million euros ($383 million) in the period January to March, up 38 percent over the year-earlier figure.

One World Trade Center, the giant monolith being built to replace the twin towers destroyed in the Sept. 11 attacks, will lay claim to the title of New York City's tallest skyscraper on Monday. Workers will erect steel columns that will make its unfinished skeleton a little over 1,250 feet high, just enough to peak over the roof of the observation deck on the Empire State Building.

The milestone is a preliminary one. Workers are still adding floors to the so-called "Freedom Tower" and it isn't expected to reach its full height for at least another year, at which point it is likely to be declared the tallest building in the U.S., and third tallest in the world.

Britain's richest people reached record levels of wealth in 2011 even as the country was slipping back towards recession, according to the annual Sunday Times Rich List.

The combined fortunes of the 1,000 richest people in Britain rose by 4.7 percent to £414.26 billion ($674 billion, 508 billion euros) despite high unemployment and harsh government cuts, beating the previous record of £412.85 billion set in 2008.

Egypt will resume supplying gas to Jordan from early May after the flow was disrupted by repeated attacks on its pipeline, a Jordanian government official said on Saturday.

Egypt informed Jordan that it would "resume gas deliveries of 100 million cubic metres per day to the kingdom early next month," the unidentified official was quoted as saying by the official Petra news agency.

The International Monetary Fund approved a $140.8 million (106.6 million euro) loan for Kosovo Friday, after cutting off funding last year in a dispute over pay raises for civil servants.

The new 20 month stand-by arrangement will back a program to ease the country's fiscal pressures and help the government shore up its cash buffer.