Sales of previously occupied homes rose last month after the worst summer for the housing market in more than a decade. And fears over flawed foreclosure documents could keep buyers on the sidelines in the final months of the year.

Sales grew 10 percent in September to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.53 million, the National Association of Realtors said Monday.

Home sales have declined 37.5 percent from their peak annual rate of 7.25 million in September 2005. They have risen from July's rate of 3.84 million, which was the lowest in 15 years.

Most experts expect roughly 5 million homes to be sold through the entire year. That would be in line with last year's totals and just above sales for 2008, the worst since 1997.

Still, sales could fall further if potential lawsuits from former homeowners claiming that banks made errors when seizing their homes make consumers fearful of buying foreclosed properties.

The Federal Reserve on Monday become the latest government regulator to announce it would be looking into whether mortgage companies cut corners on their own procedures when seizing homes.

Chairman Ben Bernanke said the Fed would look intensively to see if policies, procedures or internal controls led lenders to improperly foreclosure on homeowners. Preliminary results of an in-depth report are expected to be released next month.

A class action lawsuit was filed on September 3, 2010, in the United States District Court for the Central District of California on behalf of purchasers of Beckman Coulter, Inc.  securities during the period from July 31, 2009, to July 22, 2010.

The complaint alleges that Beckman and certain of its officers violated the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 by not disclosing that it modified its troponin test kits without proper FDA approval, requiring a recall, and that it did not disclose the adverse financial impact from quality and compliance issues relating to its troponin test kits.

The FDA sent a warning letter on June 21, 2010, criticizing Beckman for selling an "adulterated," "misbranded," and "unapproved" version of its troponin test kits. On July 22, 2010, Beckman slashed its 2010 earnings outlook, blaming the recall. On July 23, 2010, shares of Beckman fell $12.59 per share, a decline of 21% on heavy volume.

If you purchased Beckman securities during the Class Period, you may, no later than November 2, 2010, file a motion with the Court to appoint you lead plaintiff. A lead plaintiff is a representative party that directs the litigation, and will be the movant that the Court determines to have the largest financial interest in the litigation with claims typical of those of other class members and the ability to adequately represent the class. Your share in any recovery will not be enhanced by serving as a lead plaintiff. You do not need to move for lead plaintiff to recover as an absent class member. You may retain Milberg LLP, or other attorneys, for this action, but do not need to retain counsel to recover as an absent class member. The complaint in this action was not filed by Milberg.

Founded in 1965, Milberg has offices in New York, Los Angeles, Tampa, and Detroit. The Firm has litigated landmark cases and recovered billions for shareholders and consumers. Our website has additional information: (www.milberg.com).

A class-action lawsuit was filed Monday in a federal court in San Francisco accusing FarmVille creator Zynga of "illegally sharing the Facebook user data of its customers with advertisers and data brokers."

In a statement released by the lawsuit's co-lead attorneys, the filing claims Zynga violated federal law and its contract with Facebook by sharing the user data of players on games such as Farmville.

"This appears to be another example of an online company failing the American public with empty promises to respect individual privacy rights," said Michael Aschenbrener of Edelson McGuire LLC -- a co-lead attorney for the lawsuit -- in a statement.

The lawsuit seeks "monetary relief" for those affected as well as an injunction to "prevent continued privacy abuses," reads the statement.

Shares of Chinese tutoring company TAL Education Group are climbing after the initial public offering raised $120 million.

Shares had priced at $10 a share, the top of the expected range, suggesting strong demand for the company's stock.

Its shares rose $4.61, or 46 percent, to $14.61 in late morning trading Wednesday after rising as high as $15.70 earlier in the session.

The shares are trading under the symbol "XRS" on the New York Stock Exchange.

TAL says it is China's largest after-school tutoring service for K-12 students. Its IPO follows three strong first-day performances from Chinese companies since September.

China's interest-rate increase has less to do with the controversy over the value of its currency than with a straightforward effort to fight inflation— but it risks intensifying the currency battle nonetheless.

Many observers say China's move Tuesday to raise key rates is a textbook response to the country's strong growth, rising inflation and the risk of a dangerous property bubble. More increases are likely, they say, as China tries to slow the frenzied borrowing that helped it through the recent recession.

But the rate move—which comes just days before finance ministers and central bankers from the Group of 20 industrial and developing nations meet in South Korea—has implications for China's currency, too. In most economies, higher interest rates attract foreign investors looking for better returns. The cash flooding into the economy boosts the local currency. But China's economy is mostly closed, limiting—though not eliminating—the impact of higher rates on the yuan.

The increase in interest rates could actually complicate matters for China on the currency front, said Nicholas Lardy, a specialist in China at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, a Washington think tank. Given that Chinese interest rates were already above what developed countries are paying on one-year deposits, and that the market is betting that the yuan will rise over time, the rate increase could serve only to attract more investor money.