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Oil prices hovered near $93 a barrel Thursday in Asia as traders mulled whether concern over Europe’s debt crisis justifies extending a sharp sell-off during the last two weeks.

Benchmark oil for June delivery was up 26 cents to $93.07 a barrel at late morning Singapore time in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract fell $1.17 to settle at $92.81 in New York on Wednesday.

Brent crude for July delivery was down 46 cents at $109.29 per barrel in London.

Crude has plummeted about 12 percent from $106 two weeks ago amid investor worries that economic growth in the U.S. and China will slow more than previously expected. This week, political turmoil in Greece and growing anti-austerity sentiment in Europe have raised fears of a debt default and economic recession, which would undermine crude demand.

Some analysts say a slowly improving U.S. economy and signs of growing oil demand in developing countries should keep the crude price from collapsing further.

“A drastic weakening of sentiment brought oil prices down sharply, with sovereign debt fears a key element in a mounting loss of faith in economic, and hence demand, prospects,” Barclays said business card. “Crude oil prices may well remain capped on the upside in the next few weeks by fears of major economic upheavals.”

“However, given the actual economic and oil demand picture, Brent prices are more likely to remain protected around $110 rather than attempting to break through to a more extreme downside,” Barclays said.

Should crude continue to fall or at least maintain the recent pullback, it should translate to lower prices for oil products such as gasoline, which would ease global inflation pressures and give policymakers more room to implement stimulus measures or loosen monetary policy to boost economic growth.

In other energy trading, heating oil was down 1.2 cents at $2.89 per gallon and gasoline futures slid 1.5 cents at $2.85 per gallon. Natural gas rose 1 cent at $2.63 per 1,000 cubic feet.

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JPMorgan Chase is expected to accept the resignation of one of the highest-ranking women on Wall Street after the bank lost $2 billion in a trading blunder, a person familiar with the matter said Sunday.

The bank will accept the resignation of Ina Drew, its chief investment officer, the person told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity because the person was not authorized to discuss the decision publicly.

At least two other executives at the bank will be held accountable for the mistake, the person said.

The casualties come as the bank, the largest in the United States, seeks to minimize the damage caused by the $2 billion trading loss, disclosed Thursday by CEO Jamie Dimon.

Investors shaved almost 10 percent off JPMorgan’s stock price on Friday, and Dimon has said the mistake will complicate the efforts of banks to fight certain regulatory changes three years after the financial crisis.

Drew, 55, is a top lieutenant to CEO Jamie Dimon. She was paid $15.5 million last year and almost $16 million in 2010, making her one of the highest-paid officials at JPMorgan, according to a regulatory filing.

The Wall Street Journal reported earlier Sunday that Drew and two other JPMorgan executives were expected to resign soon.

The Journal also reported that Bruno Iksil, the JPMorgan trader identified as the “London whale” because of the giant bets he placed, was also likely to leave, but the paper reported that it was not clear when that would happen.

The surprise loss has been a black eye for the bank and for Dimon, who is known in the industry both as a master of risk management and as an outspoken opponent of some proposed regulation since the crisis.

JPMorgan’s disclosure has led lawmakers and critics of the banking industry to call for tougher regulation of Wall Street. Many post-crisis rules governing risk-taking by banks are still being written.

Dimon said in a TV interview aired Sunday that he was “dead wrong” when he dismissed concerns about the bank’s trading last month.

“We made a terrible, egregious mistake,” Dimon said in an interview that was taped Friday and aired on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “There’s almost no excuse for it.”

Dimon said he did not know the extent of the problem when he said in April that the concerns were a “tempest in a teapot.”

The loss came in the past six weeks. Dimon has said it came from trading in so-called credit derivatives and was designed to hedge against financial risk, not to make a profit for the bank.

A piece of financial regulation known as the Volcker rule would prevent banks from certain kinds of trading for their own profit. Dimon has said the trading involved in the $2 billion loss would not have fallen under the rule.

Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., told ABC’s “This Week” that he hopes the final version of the Volcker rule will prevent the type of trading that led to the massive loss at JPMorgan.

Dimon conceded to NBC that the bank “hurt ourselves and our credibility” and expects to “pay the price for that.” Asked what the price should be, Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., said that banks will lose their fight to weaken the rule.

“This was not a risk-reducing activity that they engaged in. This increased their risk,” Levin told NBC.

“So we’ve got to be very, very careful that the regulators here are not undermined by this huge effort to weaken the rule by putting in a huge loophole” that includes the trading involved in the JPMorgan loss, he said.

Dimon said the bank is open to inquiries from regulators. He has also promised, in an email to the bank’s employees and in a conference call with stock analysts, to get to the bottom of what happened and learn from the mistake.

Dimon told NBC that he supported giving the government the authority to dismantle a failing big bank and wipe out shareholder equity. But he stressed that JPMorgan, the largest bank in the United States, is “very strong.”

Addressing public anger toward Wall Street, Dimon said he wants a more equitable society and does not mind paying higher taxes. But he said attacking all of business is “very counterproductive.”

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The Toronto stock market is negative after elections in France and Greece over the weekend resulted in another round of uncertainty about Europe

The number of people seeking U.S. unemployment benefits remained stuck near a three-month high last week, a sign that job gains will likely remain modest.

The report disappointed economists, who had forecast a decline in unemployment applications. Even so, most analysts think employers will add about 175,000 jobs this month. That would be more than in March but less than the robust job growth achieved during the winter.

Last week, applications for unemployment aid dipped to a seasonally adjusted 388,000, the Labor Department said Thursday. That was little changed from the previous week’s figure, the highest since Jan. 7.

The four-week average, a less volatile figure, rose to 381,750, also the highest in three months. When applications fall below 375,000, it generally suggests that hiring will be strong enough to lower the unemployment rate.

The figures “aren’t bad; they’re just not as good as they have been,” said Jonathan Basile, an economist at Credit Suisse.

Applications jumped sharply three weeks ago, a sign that employers had stepped up layoffs and added fewer jobs. Economists said the increase might have been inflated by temporary layoffs during the spring holidays, when many school employees are laid off.

But applications haven’t dropped back since then. And the consensus estimate that the economy will have added about 175,000 jobs in April is well below the average of 250,000 jobs added each month from December through February guaranteed fast personal loans.

The rise in applications follows a report this month that hiring slowed in March, when employers added only 120,000 jobs.

Still, many economists suggested that weather distorted the March jobs report. A warmer winter likely pulled some hiring that normally would have occurred last month into January and February.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke agreed Wednesday that weather has likely disrupted recent data.

The warm winter “made perhaps January and February artificially strong and March perhaps artificially a little bit weak,” he said at a news conference. “I wouldn’t draw too much conclusion from the March report.”

Despite the slowing improvements, the job market appears healthier than it did last year. The unemployment rate has fallen to 8.2 percent from 9.1 percent in August.

Part of the drop came from the fact that people gave up looking for work. People who are out of work but not looking for jobs aren’t counted among the unemployed.

Economists note that unemployment benefit applications remain lower than they were last year. The government’s report next week on April employment should help clarify the jobs picture.

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European nations and Russia have proposed rival U.N. resolutions that would expand the number of U.N. cease-fire monitors in Syria from 30 to 300.

The key difference in the texts _ circulated Friday morning to the Security Council and obtained by The Associated Press _ is whether there should be any conditions on the deployment of the larger observer force.

The draft proposed by Russia, Syria’s closest ally, does not include any conditions.

The European draft says the expanded force would be deployed “expeditiously” after Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon notifies the council that Syria has implemented its pledge to withdraw all troops and heavy weapons from cities and towns “to his satisfaction.”

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP’s earlier story is below.

GENEVA (AP) _ The United Nations hopes to have 30 cease-fire monitors in Syria next week and plans are already being made for the deployment of up to 300, a spokesman for international envoy Kofi Annan said Friday, as France called on the international community to prepare for the possible failure of the increasingly fragile peace deal.

Seven observers are on the ground and another two will arrive on Monday, said Annan’s spokesman.

“During the course of next week we hope that those that we are seconding from missions in the area who can move quickly will be there and we will make the numbers up to 30,” Ahmad Fawzi told reporters in Geneva.

The preliminary agreement between Syria and the United Nations on the deployment of U.N. observers says they will have freedom to go anywhere in the country by foot or by car, take pictures, and use technical equipment to monitor compliance with the cease-fire engineered by Annan.

But the issue of using helicopters and aircraft will likely dominate discussions in the coming days, Fawzi told The Associated Press.

The larger contingent of up to 300 also still needs to be approved by the U.N. Security Council.

“As soon as the Security Council adopts a resolution authorizing up to 300 monitors on the ground, we will be ready to deploy very, very rapidly,” Fawzi said.

“We are preparing for the deployment because we feel that it is going to happen sooner or later because it must happen,” he added

In France, Foreign Minister Alain Juppe called on the international community to live up to its responsibilities and warned that if Annan’s peace plan “doesn’t function, we have to envisage other methods.”

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon accused Syrian President Bashar Assad on Thursday of failing to honor the peace plan that went into effect a week ago personal loan for poor credit.

Juppe said on France’s BFM television that his country would support a U.S.-backed proposal for a U.N. arms embargo and other tough measures against Syria.

The peace plan is “the last chance before civil war. … We don’t have the right to wait,” he said.

Juppe hosted U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and other diplomats in Paris on Thursday to try to work out options for Syria.

Annan’s diplomacy succeeded in getting Russia to back the monitoring mission, but Syria’s ally continues to resist more forceful measures.

“The Russian position is in the process of evolving,” Juppe said without elaborating.

U.N. chief Ban told the Security Council on Thursday that the situation remains “highly precarious,” citing an escalation of violence including “shelling of civilian areas, grave abuses by government forces and attacks by armed groups.”

That view was echoed by Annan’s spokesman.

“The situation on the ground is not good, as we all know,” Fawzi said. “There are casualties every day. There are incidents every day. And we have to do everything we can to stop what’s going on. The killing, the violence in all its forms.”

The observers, who report to Annan daily, will have freedom to install temporary observation posts in cities and towns, to monitor military convoys approaching population centers, to investigate any potential violation, and to access detention centers and medical centers in coordination with the International Committee of the Red Cross and Syrian authorities, the agreement says.

Meanwhile, diplomats meeting Friday in Geneva to discuss the humanitarian situation agreed to a draft plan to provide aid to civilians affected by the fighting.

The plan budgets $180 million to provide food, medicine and other supplies to about 1 million people inside Syria. It comes on top of the aid that is delivered to refugees who have fled abroad.

“The whole infrstructure of the country is under strain,” said John Ging, who heads the coordination and response division of the U.N.’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

Ging said the plan, particularly the question of how many aid workers will be allowed into the country, still needs Syria’s approval.

______

Angela Charlton in Paris contributed to this report.

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Dole Food Co.’s fresh vegetables division is recalling 756 cases of bagged salad, because they could be contaminated with salmonella.

The bags of Seven Lettuces salads were distributed in Alabama, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia and Wisconsin.

The company said the bags are being recalled, because a random sample tested by the State of New York came back positive for Salmonella. No other Dole salads are included in the recall.

The recalled salads are stamped with a use-by date of April 11, 2012, UPC code 71430 01057 and product codes 0577N089112A and 0577N089112B, the company said.

The product code and use-by date are located in the upper right-hand corner of the package, while the UPC code is on the back of the package, below the barcode fast payday loans.

Dole said that it’s coordinating with regulatory officials and that no illnesses have been reported.

Consumers should throw out the recalled salads. Dole said it’s also contacting retailers to make sure the bags in question are not available for sale.

The most common symptoms of salmonella are diarrhea, abdominal cramps and fever within eight to 72 hours of eating the contaminated food. The illness can be severe or even life-threatening for infants, older people, pregnant women and people with weakened immune systems.

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Payrolls rose far less than expected in March, keeping the door open for further monetary policy support from the Federal Reserve, even as the unemployment rate fell to a three-year low of 8.2 percent.

Employers added 120,000 jobs last month, the Labor Department said on Friday, the smallest increase since October. Economists polled by Reuters had expected nonfarm employment to increase 203,000 and the jobless rate to hold at 8.3 percent.

The weak employment growth last month likely reflected the fading boost from unseasonably warm winter weather. The payrolls count for January and February was revised to show just 4,000 more jobs created than previously reported.

The drop in the unemployment rate, to the lowest level since January 2009, reflected a drop in the labor force. The separate household survey, from which the jobless rate is derived also showed a drop in employment.

The weak employment gains could hurt President Barack Obama’s chances for re-election in November. The unemployment rate has fallen from 9.1 percent in August.

The painfully slow recovery in the labor market is a concern for Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke, who is keeping open the option of further monetary policy support for the economy if the unemployment rate remains stubbornly high pay day loans.

Minutes of the Fed’s March policy meeting released this week showed policymakers seeing a broadening of the economic recovery, leaving them slightly less inclined to launch a third round of bond purchases, known as quantitative easing, to spur growth.

The private sector added 121,000 new positions in March, while government employment edged down 1,000.

Manufacturing enjoyed another month of strong job gains, with factories adding 37,000 new positions, helped by carmakers trying to meet pent-up demand for motor vehicles. Factory jobs increased by 31,000 in February.

Construction hiring fell 7,000, the second straight monthly decline. In the huge service sector, gains were in healthcare, professional and business services categories. Temporary help fell 7,500 after rising 54,900 in February.

Despite the weak employment gains last month, average hourly earnings rose 5 cents.

The workweek dipped to 34.5 hours from 34.6 hours in February.

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The unemployment rate has fallen dramatically over the last six months, but just how low can it go?

The answer is being debated among two camps of prominent economic thinkers. One school of thought says that unemployment will return to around 5% as the economy eventually recovers. But an opposing view states that permanent changes in the labor market mean higher unemployment is here to stay.

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Obama battles job crisis

Before Obama even took office, America had lost 4.4 million jobs. Track his progress since then.

Among those who believe the first, more optimistic scenario is Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke. He thinks that unemployment will fall as part of the regular business cycle, and stimulative policies that boost demand could bring us back to a more normal unemployment rate of between 5% and 6% some time after 2014.

There’s plenty of research to back that up. A recent report by economists at Harvard, the San Francisco Federal Reserve and the International Monetary Fund suggests that three-quarters of the sharp rise in unemployment during the financial crisis was in fact due to cyclical, not permanent, factors.

And unemployment has indeed fallen sharply as the economy has slowly recovered from the recession. As of February, the unemployment rate stood at 8.3%, a substantial drop from 10% at the height of the financial crisis.

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Under the second, far less rosy scenario, 5% unemployment is out of reach. Devotees of "structural" unemployment, believe permanent shifts mean the job market may never fully recover, even as the broader economy does cash advance.

Nobel Prize winning economist Edmund Phelps, for example, calls a return to a 5% unemployment rate a "pipe-dream."

Phelps likens the economy to a skater who’s taken a bad fall. Just getting a boost might not be enough, because the skater may have a few broken bones.

What are those broken bones?

Less innovation, increased competition from low-wage countries, more efficient technology and a shortage of high-tech skills among American workers may all be to blame.

Another problem: Baby Boomers are working longer than their predecessors, creating a demographic shift in the labor market.

Plus, many Americans are finding themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time.

"Many workers do not have the skills required by employers in the location where employers are seeking jobs," Wells Fargo Chief Economist John Silvia said in a recent research note.

All of these factors are a recipe for a longer lasting shift in the labor market, and mean stimulative policies won’t have much of an impact, according to the structuralists.

So just how much further will unemployment fall?

The Labor Department will release March’s unemployment rate on Friday. Economists surveyed by CNNMoney are expecting the report to show the unemployment rate remained at 8.3% for the month.

Longer term forecasts are all over the map.

The Congressional Budget Office predicts that the unemployment rate will eventually fall as low as 5.3%, but not until 2021. Economists at Goldman Sachs, however, estimate that due to structural reasons the new normal unemployment rate may now be 6% at best.

The biggest wild card that could shift that balance is the long-term unemployed. Of the 12.8 million Americans who are unemployed, 42.6% have been out of work for six months or more.

"If progress in reducing unemployment is too slow, the long-term unemployed will see their skills and labor force attachment atrophy further possibly converting a cyclical problem into a structural one," Bernanke said last week. 

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India’s prime minister said Thursday that international institutions are failing to lift up the developing world and endorsed the creation of a new development bank to be run by five fast-rising nations.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh spoke at a summit of the so called BRICS group _ comprised of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa _ aimed at harnessing the nations’ increasing global clout and forging stronger ties between their fast-growing economies.

The five countries represent 45 percent of the world’s population, a quarter of its land mass and a quarter of its economy at $13.5 trillion.

Though the group has accomplished little of note at its three previous meetings, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff insisted in an opinion piece in the Times of India that it had changed “the axis of international politics.”

At the summit, the five nations are expected to agree to do more business with each other in their local currencies, to help insulate from U.S. dollar fluctuations while lifting trade within the bloc from last year’s $230 billion to $500 billion by 2015.

They also hoped to move closer to creating a new development bank, much like the World Bank and Asian Development Bank, saying it would streamline efforts to raise capital in poor nations and facilitate more business among themselves.

“Institutions of global political and economic governance created more than six decades ago have not kept pace with the changing world,” Singh told the summit payday loans with no fax.

In response, the five nations are working to set up a bank funded and managed by them that would improve poor nations’ access to development funds and boost emerging economies, Singh said.

“Developing countries need access to capital,” he said.

The summit came as the Indian capital remained under a heavy security umbrella since a Tibetan exile lit himself on fire at an anti-China protest Monday. He died from his burns Wednesday.

Chinese President Hu Jintao’s hotel was under virtual lock down, while Tibetan neighborhoods were sealed, with police allowing people out only for medical or court appointments.

Hundreds of police manned barricades along roads throughout the city, some carrying blankets soaked in water to quickly smother the flames of any protesters who try to set themselves alight.

Delhi police spokesman Rajan Bhagat said authorities had detained many Tibetan protesters in recent days, but would release most of them without charge in a few hours.

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