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General Motors Co. has retaken the title of world’s top-selling automaker, selling just over 9 million cars and trucks across the globe.

The company said Thursday that it sold 9.03 million vehicles worldwide last year, up 7.6 percent from 2010. That’s more than 1 million better than Japan’s Toyota Motor Corp., which took the title away from GM in 2008.

GM also beat Germany’s fast-growing Volkswagen AG, which last week reported record global sales of 8.16 million in 2011, up 14 percent from the year before. Toyota said it sold 7.9 million vehicles worldwide last year.

GM had held the global sales crown for more than seven decades before losing it to Toyota as GM’s sales tanked while it headed toward financial ruin. In 2009, GM filed for bankruptcy protection, needing a U.S. government bailout to survive.

Now GM is profitable again and its vehicles are selling well across the globe. The company reported net income of $7.1 billion for the first three quarters of last year, and it is expected to add to that number when it reports fourth-quarter and full-year results in February.

Toyota is aiming for a comeback this year and has predicted that it will sell 8.48 million vehicles in 2012. Its sales were hurt last year because the March earthquake in Japan slowed its factories, and dealers ran short of cars to sell.

Auto industry analysts predict a tight race this year between GM, Volkswagen, Toyota and the joint venture between Nissan and Renault.

Some analysts have said that VW is the world’s biggest automaker because GM’s figures include vehicles made by its Wuling joint venture in China Same day payday loans. Many don’t count Wuling because GM doesn’t have controlling interest in the company, but GM includes it in global sales figures.

Excluding Wuling, GM would have been topped by Volkswagen.

Being the world’s top-selling automaker doesn’t mean much for the bottom line. But GM retaking the title is an example of how far the company has come since its 2009 bankruptcy.

GM CEO Dan Akerson said last week that the company isn’t that concerned about posting large sales numbers and is focused more on making money so it can reinvest in products and generate returns for shareholders. But he says strong sales can bring strong finances.

“You’re not going to achieve the financial goals we want to achieve and have declining market share or declining numbers of units sold,” he said. “So it’s one indicator among many.”

GM said its sales were up in all four of its regions: North America, Europe, South America and International Operations, which includes Asia. The Chevrolet brand led the way, selling a record 4.76 million vehicles across the world.

GM sold 640,000 more cars and trucks last year than it did in 2010, when it sold 8.39 million.

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China warned its banks to resist demand for credit from local governments as new officials in cities, towns and villages pursue projects that bolster growth, a person with knowledge of the matter said.

The China Banking Regulatory Commission (CBRZ) told lenders earlier this month to be on watch for loan applications for new programs disguised as funding requests for unfinished ones, said the person, declining to be identified as the order isn

More than 1,000 demonstrators jeered government austerity measures in downtown Bucharest on Monday as Romania’s prime minister warned that violent clashes like those that left 59 injured over the weekend could jeopardize stability and economic growth.

Protesters who gathered in freezing temperatures for a fifth day of demonstrations chanted “Freedom!” and held banners saying “Hunger and poverty have gripped Romania!” They waved flags with the center ripped out, a symbol of the 1989 uprising against former Communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu.

There were smaller protests in another dozen Romanians cities, but it was not clear how many people had gathered around the country.

On Sunday, police clashed with a small contingent of around 1,000 protesters in the capital. Tear gas and flares were used to repel demonstrators hurling stones and firebombs.

Interior minister Traian Igas said Monday that around 8,700 people attended weekend demonstrations, but only in Bucharest did the protests turn violent, when _ according to interior ministry officials _ fans of football clubs infiltrated the demonstrations and wreaked havoc in the city.

Bucharest mayor Sorin Oprescu said the windows of shops, banks and bus stations were smashed, and street lights vandalized.

Prime Minister Emil Boc on Monday called the violence “unacceptable,” and said it “cannot be tolerated.” He promised, however, that a controversial health law allowing for some privatization of emergency services will be redrafted.

Boc urged Romanians to understand that tough austerity measures were needed to avoid a default. “We understand the hardships Romanians are facing … The crisis has been harsher than we imagined,” he said.

But, protesters out on Monday were not convinced that the austerity measures were necessary.

“We are staying here even though it is freezing cold,” said one protester who identified himself only as Radu, wrapped in a thick coat, scarf and hat as snow fell. “We have a real backbone not like the government which turned its back on us.”

In 2009, Romania took a two-year euro20 billion ($27.5 billion) loan from the International Monetary Fund, the European Union and the World Bank as its economy shrank by 7.1 percent. It imposed harsh austerity measures under the agreement, reducing public wages by 25 percent and increasing taxes.

Anger has mounted over the wage cuts, slashed benefits, higher taxes and widespread corruption.

Alis Grasu of Bucharest’s ambulance services said 59 people suffered injuries during the disturbances, 23 were briefly hospitalized and three are still in the hospital.

Police official Aurel Moise said about 250 people were fined for their conduct and 36 will be investigated.

Authorities urged peaceful protesters to distance themselves from troublemakers at future marches.

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Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda said containing Japan

Now that we’ve essentially socialized the mortgage business, the federal government finds itself with two incompatible objectives.

It wants to help people stay in their homes, but it also wants to minimize the losses it takes on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the two mortgage giants that landed in the Treasury’s lap during the financial crisis.

Now the Federal Reserve, concerned that a moribund housing market is slowing the nation’s economic recovery, wants bureaucrats to focus more on the former and less on the latter. In other words, the Fed thinks the Treasury should be willing to lose more money in order to prop up housing prices.

The Fed, in a white paper sent to Congress last week, lists several measures that Fannie and Freddie could take to bolster the housing market. It suggests, for example, that the government-run companies limit a practice called forced repurchase, in which Fannie and Freddie force lenders to take back bad loans.

This policy reduces the losses to Fannie and Freddie — and eventually the Treasury — but the Fed says it discourages lenders from making new loans to anyone with less-than-perfect credit. That locks a lot of people out of the housing market, even though record-low interest rates have made mortgages more affordable than ever.

“Moving further in this direction is thus likely to involve additional taxpayer funding, the overriding of private contract rights, or both, which raises difficult public policy issues and tradeoffs high quality business cards.”

Ed Pinto, a former Fannie Mae executive who’s now a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, thinks the Fed’s ideas are dangerous. He argues that they wouldn’t help the housing market overall, and might actually delay the recovery even further.

“The way I look at it, housing has been terribly politicized for the last 20 to 25 years, and is now nationalized,” Pinto says. “You could do more, but I think the Fed has it exactly backward. Jobs create demand for housing, not the other way around.”

The goal, he adds, should be to reduce the government’s role in the housing market, not increase it. Housing prices have to hit bottom before they can start to recover, and more intervention merely delays the bottoming-out process.

“The way these markets work is that everything overcorrects,” Pinto said. “If the government would let the market clear, the overcorrection would stop.”

Pinto doesn’t advocate a completely hands-off approach. He thinks Fannie and Freddie could ease restrictions on their small-investor program, which currently limits landlords to eight rental properties, as a way of getting renters into some foreclosed houses. He also likes the idea of modifying some underwater mortgages to help homeowners pay them down faster.

But when the Fed talks about turning the government into a large-scale landlord, or deliberately increasing the Treasury’s losses on mortgages, Pinto starts to worry. That’s a formula for an even longer housing slump, he says, and certainly not a recipe for recovery.

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Sales (RSTAMOM) at U.S. retailers probably rose in December as Americans bought discounted holiday items, giving the economy a boost entering 2012, economists said before a report today.

The projected 0.3 percent gain would follow a 0.2 percent advance in November, according to the median forecast of 75 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News. First-time jobless claims were little changed last week, another report may show.

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The Food and Drug Administration says it will step up testing for a fungicide that has been found in low levels in orange juice.

FDA officials said they aren’t concerned about the safety of the juice but will increase testing to make sure the contamination isn’t a problem. In a letter to the juice industry Monday, the agency said that an unnamed juice company contacted FDA in late December and said it had detected low levels of the fungicide carbendazim in the company’s own orange juice and also in its competitors’ juice. Fungicides are used to control fungi or fungal spores in agriculture.

Orange juice futures surged nearly 11 percent on Tuesday, gaining 20 cents to close at about $2.08 cents a pound. Investors are concerned that increased testing could pinch juice supplies. TransWorld Futures analyst Robert Rutger said the supply questions were enough to send prices higher, even though current inventories are relatively healthy.

Carbendazim is not currently approved for use on citrus in the U.S., but is used in Brazil, which exports orange juice to the United States. Brazil is the biggest producer of oranges in the world, according to the Agriculture Department.

Top orange juice brands in the U.S. include PepsiCo’s Tropicana and Minute Maid, marketed by The Coca-Cola Co.

An FDA spokeswoman said the company’s testing found levels up to 35 parts per billion of the fungicide, far below the European Union’s maximum residue level of 200 parts per billion. The U.S. has not established a maximum residue level for carbendazim in oranges.

In the letter to the Juice Products Association, FDA official Nega Beru said the agency will begin testing shipments of orange juice at the border and will detain any that contain traces of the chemical cash advance loans. Because it is not approved for use in this country, any amount found in food is illegal.

Beru said that because the FDA doesn’t believe the levels of residue are harmful, and the agency won’t remove any juice currently on store shelves. But he asked the industry to ensure that suppliers in Brazil and elsewhere stop using the fungicide.

“If the agency identifies orange juice with carbendazim at levels that present a public health risk, it will alert the public and take the necessary action to ensure that the product is removed from the market,” he said.

The discovery comes after the agency said it would also step up testing for arsenic in apple juice. FDA officials said last year that the agency is considering tightening restrictions for the levels of arsenic allowed in the juice after consumer groups pushed the agency to crack down on the contaminant.

Studies show that apple juice has generally low levels of arsenic, and the government says it is safe to drink. But consumer advocates say the FDA is allowing too much of the chemical _ which is sometimes natural, sometimes man made _ into apple juices favored by thirsty kids.

Patty Lovera of the consumer group Food and Water Watch said the federal government needs to rely on its own testing, not that of the companies.

“The federal government needs to set consistent, meaningful, enforceable standards for all toxins,” she said.

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Europe

New Zealand authorities trying to clean up a wrecked cargo ship that split in two over the weekend want beachgoers to stay away from the debris that has washed ashore _ especially the bags of powdered milk some of them have been scavenging.

Waihi Police Sgt. Dave Litton says police closed public access to popular Waihi Beach on Monday morning after four cargo containers and other debris from the vessel Rena washed ashore. He says police received calls about people driving off with some of the bags of milk powder that are strewn along the beach.

Authorities say the milk and other items washed ashore could be a health hazard.

The Greek-owned Rena grounded on a reef in October and split in two in over the weekend, spilling about 300 containers.

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

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) _ A cargo ship grounded off the New Zealand coast since October has split in two, spilling sea containers and debris and sparking fears of a fresh oil spill, maritime officials said Sunday.

The wreck of the Greek-owned Rena was described as New Zealand’s worst maritime environmental disaster even before the rear section of the ship, lashed by pounding seas, broke away overnight. The ship previously spilled heavy fuel oil that fouled pristine North Island beaches and killed up to 20,000 seabirds, and despite salvage efforts nearly 400 tons of oil remain onboard.

Maritime officials said the front section of the wreck remains stuck in its original position, but the stern section slipped at least 100 feet (30 meters) away from the bow and is “moving significantly,” pounded by 19-foot (6-meter) swells.

The storm that split the vessel will continue for another three to four days, Maritime New Zealand spokesman Ross Henderson said.

Officials said up to 300 of the roughly 880 containers that had been on board were lost when the ship broke apart. Of those, about 30 percent had been fitted with monitoring devices and some 30 containers had already been located.

Oil has been seen leaking from the broken ship. Alex van Wijngaarden, on-scene commander for the national response team, said oil from the vessel could come ashore around midnight Sunday.

“While reports at this stage indicate there has not been a significant release of oil, with the Rena in its current fragile state, a further release is likely,” he said. “While it is unknown at this stage exactly how much oil may be released, teams have been mobilized and will be ready to respond to anything that may come ashore.”

Environment Minister Nick Smith told reporters that the “risks for the environment are a fraction of what they were in October,” though the roughly 385 tons of oil still aboard the ship is about the same amount that leaked from the vessel soon after it ran aground. Salvage crews previously removed 1,100 tons of oil from the ship.

Most of the oil is in tanks in the stern section, which could end up sinking. Some of that oil could end up dissipating in the ocean rather than washing up on beaches.

The containers, meanwhile, spilled goods including timber, wool, bales of recycled plastic and bags of milk powder. The debris could begin washing ashore later Sunday.

Some containers have been sighted floating up to 20 miles (32 kilometers) northwest of the stricken ship, Port of Tauranga chief executive Mark Cairns said.

“They have been caught in a strong coastal current” fueled by the storm, he said.

The Rena ran aground on Astrolabe Reef 14 miles (22 kilometers) from Tauranga Harbor on North Island on Oct. 5.

Salvage crews have plucked 389 of the ship’s 1,370 loaded cargo containers from its decks since it ran aground, while some 98 have been washed over board in the past three months.

One eyewitness, Warwick Roberts, said the rear section was sliding along the reef.

The “stern has reared up and center section is not visible. Large breaking waves observed on bow,” he told the New Zealand Herald website.

A two-mile (three-kilometer) no-go zone is in force around the wreck.

Investigations by The Associated Press last month revealed that Australian authorities impounded the vessel, but released it the next day after Liberian maritime authorities intervened, essentially saying the ship was safe to sail and the problems could be fixed later. The Rena, like many ships, is registered in Liberia.

Some 10 weeks later, the Rena ran full-steam into a well-marked reef off the coast of New Zealand. It’s not clear whether the previously identified problems played any role.

The captain and Rena’s navigating officer face criminal charges of operating a ship in a dangerous or risky manner, polluting the environment and altering the ship’s documents after the crash.

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Iran has begun uranium enrichment at a new underground site built to withstand possible airstrikes, a leading hard-line newspaper reported Sunday in another show of defiance against Western pressure to rein in Tehran’s nuclear program.

The operations at the bunker-like facility south of Tehran, reported by the Kayhan daily newspaper, are small in comparison to Iran’s main enrichment site. But the centrifuges at the underground labs are considered more efficient and are shielded from aerial surveillance and protected against airstrikes by up to 300 feet (90 meters) of mountain rock.

Uranium enrichment is at the core of the international standoff over Iran’s nuclear program. The U.S. and its allies fear Iran could use its enrichment facilities to develop high-grade nuclear material for warheads.

Iran _ which claims it only seeks nuclear reactors for energy and research _ has sharply increased its threats and military posturing against stronger pressures, including U.S. sanctions targeting Iran’s Central Bank in attempts to complicate its ability to sell oil.

A senior commander of the Revolutionary Guard force was quoted as saying Tehran’s leadership has decided to order the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, a strategic oil route, if the country’s petroleum exports are blocked. Revolutionary Guard ground forces also staged war games in eastern Iran in an apparent display of resolve against U.S. forces just over the border in Afghanistan.

Iranian officials have issued similar threats, but this is the strongest statement yet by a top commander in the security establishment.

“The supreme authorities … have insisted that if enemies block the export of our oil, we won’t allow a drop of oil to pass through the Strait of Hormuz. This is the strategy of the Islamic Republic in countering such threats,” Revolutionary Guard deputy commander Ali Ashraf Nouri was quoted as saying by another newspaper, the Khorasan daily.

The latest statements are certain to ramp up tensions with the U.S. and its allies, which are trying to increase pressure on Iran to punish it for its disputed nuclear program.

For the moment, however, U.S. officials are seeking stronger diplomatic and economic pressure on Iran rather than increasing threats of military action. A number of experts say Iran is unlikely to close the strait because that could hurt Iran as much as the West.

In an interview broadcast Sunday, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Iran is laying the groundwork for making nuclear weapons someday, but is not yet building a bomb. Panetta reiterated U.S. concerns about a unilateral strike by Israel against Iran’s nuclear facilities, saying the action could trigger Iranian retaliation against U.S. forces in the region.

“We have common cause here” with Israel, he said. “And the better approach is for us to work together.”

Panetta’s remarks on CBS’ “Face the Nation” reflect the Obama administration’s long-held view that Iran is not yet committed to building a nuclear arsenal, only to create the industrial and scientific capacity to allow one if its leaders to decide to take that final step.

The Kayhan newspaper, which is close to Iran’s ruling clerics, said Tehran has begun injecting uranium gas into sophisticated centrifuges at the Fordo facility near the holy city of Qom.

“Kayhan received reports yesterday that show Iran has begun uranium enrichment at the Fordo facility amid heightened foreign enemy threats,” the newspaper said in a front-page report faxless pay day loans. Kayhan’s manager is a representative of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has the final word on all important matters of state.

Iran’s nuclear chief, Fereidoun Abbasi, said Saturday that his country will “soon” begin enrichment at Fordo. It was impossible to immediately reconcile the two reports.

Iran has a major uranium enrichment facility in Natanz in central Iran, where nearly 8,000 centrifuges are operating. Tehran began enrichment at Natanz in 2006.

Nouri said Iran’s leadership has made a strategic decision to close the Strait of Hormuz should its exports be blocked. One-sixth of the world’s oil flows to market through the strait, which is jointly controlled by Iran and Oman at the mouth of the Persian Gulf.

President Barack Obama approved new sanctions against Iran a week ago, targeting the central bank and its ability to sell petroleum abroad. The U.S. has delayed implementing the sanctions for at least six months, worried about sending the price of oil higher at a time when the global economy is struggling. But the new sanctions nevertheless prompted a series of threats from Iranian officials about closing the Strait of Hormuz.

The newspaper paraphrased Nouri as saying that a 10-day naval drill that ended Jan. 3 was preparation for such a closure. The Guard, which is Iran’s most powerful military force and which has its own naval arm, has planned more sea maneuvers for February.

Khamenei “determined a new strategy for the armed forces, by which any threat from enemies will be responded to with threats,” Nouri said.

The U.S. and Israel have said that all options remain open, including military action, should Iran continue with its enrichment program.

Tehran says it needs the program to produce fuel for future nuclear reactors and medical radioisotopes needed for cancer patients.

The country has been enriching uranium to less than 5 percent for years, but it began to further enrich part of its uranium stockpile to nearly 20 percent as of February 2010, saying it needs the higher grade material to produce fuel for a Tehran reactor that makes medical radioisotopes for cancer patients. Weapons-grade uranium is usually about 90 percent enriched.

Iran says the higher enrichment activities _ to nearly 20 percent _ will be carried out at Fordo. These operations are of particular concern to the West because uranium at 20 percent enrichment can be converted much more quickly for use in a nuclear warhead than uranium enriched to only 3.5 percent.

Built next to a military complex, Fordo was long kept secret and was only acknowledged by Iran after it was identified by Western intelligence agencies in September 2009.

The facility is a hardened tunnel and is protected by air defense missile batteries and the Revolutionary Guard. The site is located about 20 miles (32 kilometers) north of Qom, the religious nerve center of Iran’s ruling system.

“The Fordo facility, like Natanz, has been designed and built underground. The enemy doesn’t have the ability to damage it,” the semiofficial Mehr news agency quoted nuclear chief Abbasi as saying Sunday.

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