(Reuters) - U.S. job growth accelerated more than expected in July as private employers stepped up hiring, easing fears the economy was sliding into a fresh recession. Nonfarm payrolls increased 117,000, the Labor Department said on Friday, above market expectations for an 85,000 gain. In the same report, the count for May and June was revised to show 56,000 more jobs added than previously reported. The unemployment rate dipped to 9.1 percent from 9.2 percent in June, but that was because discouraged job-seekers gave up the hunt.

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(Reuters) - The selloff in U.S. stocks intensified on Friday as investors worried about slower global growth despite stronger-than-expected U.S. jobs data. U.S. composite equity volume hit 7.2 billion through noon, the busiest morning so far this year. The CBOE Volatility index hit 38.82, the highest level since May 2010.

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(Reuters) - The message from this week's market rout is crystal-clear: investors have lost confidence in their politicians, who urgently need to do something dramatic to reduce risks to the global economy. By some measures, the world economy is in better shape to withstand shocks than it was in the aftermath of the failure of investment bank Lehman Brothers nearly three years ago.

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(Reuters) - European leaders came under heavy pressure on Friday to take decisive action to stem a spiralling debt crisis while robust U.S. jobs data brought some relief to battered world markets. Fears of U.S. recession and the spreading euro zone crisis has wiped $2.5 trillion off world stocks this week. Better than expected U.S. jobs growth in July helped Wall Street open higher, gaining back at least some of the previous session's sharp losses, but the Dow Jones Industrial Average soon subsided to stand flat on the day.

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(Reuters) - Procter & Gamble Co posted a bigger-than-expected rise in quarterly profit on Friday, as cost cuts and price increases helped mitigate the impact of more expensive materials and some sluggish markets such as the United States. P&G also gave its first forecasts for its new fiscal year. The world's largest household products maker is likely to miss Wall Street estimates this quarter as it absorbs higher costs for oil and paper-based materials and has not yet pushed through all its price increases.

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(Reuters) - Hitachi Ltd (6501.T) and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (7011.T) are ready to walk away from merger talks, sources with knowledge of the matter said on Friday, dashing hopes for a groundbreaking marriage of two of Japan's oldest conglomerates. The suspension of talks comes after news first surfaced on Thursday that the two companies, which can trace their histories back more than 100 years, were discussing a limited combination of some businesses such as next-generation power operations and smart grids, with an eye toward a complete merger later on.

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(Reuters) - Mortgage finance giant Fannie Mae said it would ask for an additional $5.1 billion from taxpayers as a weaker housing market causes continued losses on loans made prior to 2009. The largest U.S. residential mortgage funds provider on Friday also reported a second-quarter net loss attributable to common shareholders of $5.2 billion, or 90 cents per share. It forecast continued weakness ahead, with high unemployment and foreclosures expected to put more downward pressure on home prices.

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(Reuters) - A little over a year after spinning off from Citigroup (C.N), Primerica (PRI.N) is considering a first share buy-back program, as one of the biggest U.S. term life insurers wants to put its excess capital to use, executives said. Primerica, which has one of the best capital ratios among U.S. life insurers, had a risk-based capital (RBC) ratio above 600 percent at end-June, and plans to use Triple X reserve financing to put some of that excess to work. High-quality life insurers generally have around twice the minimum RBC level of about 200 percent set by state regulators.

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(Reuters) - The S&P 500 and Dow both fell more than 3 percent on Thursday, with investors worried about the outlook for the U.S. economy and the debt crisis in Europe. The Dow Jones industrial average .DJI was down 351.48 points, or 2.95 percent, at 11,544.96, after briefly falling 3 percent. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index .SPX was down 42.05 points, or 3.34 percent, at 1,218.29. The Nasdaq Composite Index .IXIC was down 94.45 points, or 3.51 percent, at 2,598.62.

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(Reuters) - The number of Americans claiming new unemployment benefits was steady last week and heavy discounting lifted sales at retailers in July, hopeful signs for the sputtering economy. Initial claims for state jobless benefits nudged down 1,000 to 400,000, the Labor Department said on Thursday. Economists had expected claims to rise to 405,000 and the dip last week indicated an easing in layoffs, which have weighed on employment in the past two months.

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