Economy
With data showing the euro zone's economy coming to a halt in Q2, Mario Draghi announced that he would do all in his power to accelerate growth but reaffirmed the additional responsibility for individual countries to make their economies fitter. The ECB President also confirmed that "monetary policy will remain accommodating for a long time" and signaled the bank was ready to use unconventional tools to spur growth and bring inflation back to just under 2%.

President Barack Obama urged countries to follow the U.S.'s lead on combating global warming at yesterday's U.N. Climate Summit. While leaders were united on laying the groundwork for a new global climate-change treaty, sharp differences arose on matters such as deforestation, carbon pollution and methane leaks from oil and gas production. The U.S. also decided not to join 73 countries in supporting a price on carbon, which Congress previously indicated it would reject.

Stocks
The SEC is investigating whether the way bond giant Pimco values bond holdings may artificially boost the returns of its flagship fund. For the past several months, regulators have been probing Bill Gross's $3.6B Total Return Fund (NYSEARCA:BOND), seeing if the ETF bought bonds at discounted prices, but then relied on higher valuations for the assets when calculating the holdings' value. The move could make it seem as though the ETF had scored quick gains.

Walgreen is considering the sale of just over 50% of its infusion services business, in a deal that could value the unit at around $1.5B. The division offers infusion services at home and at care centers across the U.S. Infusion therapies are used for medical conditions such as bleeding disorders and serious infections. BofA (NYSE:BAC) has been hired by Walgreen (NYSE:WAG) for the sale, which has already attracted interest from several private equity firms.

Starbucks is acquiring the 60.5% of Starbucks Coffee Japan (OTC:STBJF) it doesn't own from JV partner Sazaby League in a 2-stage deal valued at ¥99.5B ($913.5M). The JV was formed in 1995, and now runs over 1K stores. Starbucks (NASDAQ:SBUX) expects the purchase to be slightly accretive to FY15 (ends Sep. '15) results on an adjusted basis. The company asserts the deal "positions Starbucks to accelerate growth across multiple channels in Japan, including the potential introduction of new concepts, such as Teavana."

Air France has withdrawn its plans to develop its low-cost unit Transavia says French Transport Minister Alain Vidalies. "The Transavia Europe project has been abandoned," announced Vidalies. "It isn't suspended for three months, it's been withdrawn by management." Air France (OTCQX:AFLYY) pilots have been on strike since Sept. 15, protesting the airline's transfer of most of its short- and medium-haul services to Transavia.

GM is on course to surpass 2013's sales tally of 3.16M vehicles in China this year, having so far sold 2.3M vehicles in the world's largest car market. The new growth is important for GM (NYSE:GM), having been displaced by Volkswagen (OTCQX:VLKAY) last year as the number one car company in China by sales. Meanwhile, Toyota (NYSE:TM) has announced it is slashing its Chinese sales forecast citing the country's slowing economy and high inventory.

Oracle's new co-CEOs Safra Catz and Mark Hurd will receive a one-time option to purchase 500K shares of Oracle (NYSE:ORCL) a piece, while outgoing chief exec Larry Ellison, will receive 750K fewer shares for the 2015 fiscal year. The new top execs also qualify for performance-based bonuses of 125K shares each, on top of the 562.5K shares of performance-based stock granted to them both in July. However, the company is slashing its long-term exec compensation program, lowering Catz and Hurd's total stock options to 2.75M a piece from 5M a year earlier.

Following a three-year long restructuring, Blackberry is launching the Passport, which boasts a big square screen and a touch-sensitive tactile keyboard. The new mobile phone will feature an unsubsidized U.S. price of $599 - $50 below the 16GB iPhone 6, and $150 below the 16GB iPhone 6 Plus. Within a couple of months, Blackberry (NASDAQ:BBRY) is also expected to launch the Classic, which bears similarities to its once popular Bold smartphone.

Verizon has hired boutique TAP Advisors to find a buyer and work out a lease-back agreement for its 12K wireless towers by year's end, Bloomberg reports. A deal could bring in close to $6B, given how much AT&T (NYSE:T) received per tower in last year's $4.83B sale/leasing deal with Crown Castle (NYSE:CCI). Verizon's (NYSE:VZ) attempt to de-leverage comes after raising over $60B in debt to help pay for its Vodafone (NASDAQ:VOD) deal earlier this year.

RBS had hoped to sell 140M shares of Citizens Financial (NYSE:CFG) for between $23 and $25 each, but chatter over the past few days suggesting investors were balking at that price proved correct. At a price of $21.50, the IPO will raise $3B for RBS, well less than the $3.5B at the top end of the hoped-for range. While a setback, the more important issue will be the boost to RBS's (NYSE:RBS) capital ratio from cutting its stake in Citizens below 50% and removing the unit's assets from its balance sheet.

Fraudulent transactions are starting to be seen from the Home Depot (NYSE:HD) data breach, and have even drained cash from customer accounts in some cases. Financial institutions are now ramping up their efforts to block the transactions by rejecting them if they appear unusual. Home Depot has previously said that 56M cards may have been exposed in the five-month attack on its payment terminals.

U.S. Steel's Canadian subsidiary is looking to quickly put up its Hamilton assets for sale and auction off its operations on Lake Erie, after filing for protection from its creditors last week. The restructuring could affect more than 14K retirees who depend on U.S. Steel (NYSE:X) pensions. The Canada unit has a pension fund deficit of more than $750M.

21st Century Fox met with Starz yesterday to discuss a possible purchase of the company, although a person familiar with the matter says Fox (NASDAQ:FOXA) took the meeting as a courtesy. While there is no deal yet, a full acquisition of the company would be valued at more than $3.2B, based on Tuesday's closing price. Starz (NASDAQ:STRZA) has been recently struggling to create original programming, and also lost a deal to Netflix over accessing movies from Disney, which will take effect in early 2017.

Today's economic calendar:

7:00 MBA Mortgage Applications
10:00 New Home Sales
10:30 EIA Petroleum Inventories
11:30 Results of $13B, 2-Year FRN Auction
12:05 PM Fed's Mester: Economic Outlook and Monetary Policy
1:00 PM Results of $35B, 5-Year Note Auction

Notable earnings before today's open: ACN, KBH, PAYX, MTN

Notable earnings after today's close: JBL, WOR