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Former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin was sentenced on Wednesday to 10 years in federal prison for corruption during the critical years of rebuilding after Hurricane Katrina devastated the city in 2005. A jury in February found Nagin, a Democrat, guilty on charges including bribery, wire fraud, conspiracy, money laundering and tax evasion. Nagin, 58, stirred national controversy with his erratic behavior after Katrina breached floodwalls and inundated New Orleans in 2005, killing at least 1,500 people and leaving tens of thousands homeless. Citing Nagin's devotion to family and commitment to helping New Orleans, U.S. District Judge Helen Ginger Berrigan said a shorter prison term than that recommended under federal sentencing guidelines was warranted. She ordered Nagin to turn himself in to begin serving his sentence by Sept. 8. With good behavior, and barring any appeals, Nagin could get out of prison after about 8-1/2 years. Berrigan also ordered Nagin, who prosecutors say ac

Israeli air strikes shook Gaza every few minutes on Wednesday, and militants kept up rocket fire at Israel's heartland in intensifying warfare that Palestinian officials said has killed at least 53 people in the Hamas-dominated enclave. Missiles from Israel's Iron Dome defense system shot into the sky to intercept rockets launched, for the second straight day, at Tel Aviv, the country's commercial capital. Some were also aimed at Israel's Dimona nuclear plant, 80 km (50 miles) from Gaza, but were either shot down or landed in open country. With cries of "Allahu akbar" (God is Greatest), Palestinians in the Gaza Strip cheered as rockets streaked overhead toward Israel, in attacks that could provide a popularity boost for Islamist Hamas, whose rift with neighboring Egypt's military-backed government has deepened economic hardship. Dimona, desert site of a nuclear reactor and widely assumed to have a role in atomic weaponry, was targeted by locally made

San Francisco-based 137 Ventures said it raised $137 million for its second fund, underscoring the eagerness of investors to buy shares in start-ups before they hold initial public offerings. _0"> The firm, which buys private-company shares from company founders, early employees, and other investors, counts companies such as data-analytics business Palantir, space-exploration firm SpaceX and blog site Tumblr among its portfolio. Tumblr sold to Yahoo! Inc last year for $1.1 billion. With start-ups staying private longer than a decade ago, many investors believe they are missing out on big gains they could have once captured through public shares. In the past, the opportunity to invest in start-ups went largely to venture capitalists. But increasingly, start-up companies are allowing early shareholders to cash out through tightly controlled sales to approved buyers such as 137 Ventures or other outlets such as SecondMarket. Investors in 137 Ventures tend to be institution

Wealth management firms are trying to get millennials excited about investing and hope to win their trust - and the sizeable wealth they are expected to control in the future. Those now 21 to 31 years old will control $9 trillion in assets by 2018, and that will continue to grow, Deloitte estimated. Millennials also stand to inherit some $36 trillion by 2061, according to Boston College's Center on Wealth and Philanthropy. "We have a huge generational shift in wealth coming up," Tom Nally, TD Ameritrade Institutional's president, told Reuters recently. "We want to make sure our advisers are ready to serve next-generation investors." But it could be a tough sell: Millennials tend to leave their parents' advisers when they inherit money, and they are leery of stocks. They "are the most conservative generation since the Great Depression," reported a January UBS Wealth Management study, which found millennials keeping 52 percent of their savin

Investors who want to put money behind the idea that female leadership helps companies excel will have a new way to invest on Thursday when Barclays Bank PLC launches the Barclays Women in Leadership Total Return Index and exchange-traded notes. The new index will be composed of companies with a female chief executive officer or women making up at least one-fourth of the board of directors, Barclays said on Wednesday in a statement. In addition to these requirements, companies will have to meet specific market capitalization and trading volume thresholds to be included, the London-based bank said. The Barclays ETNs will track the index and trade under the ticker symbol "WIL" on the NYSE Arca Exchange. In connection with the launch, Barclays executives will ring the opening bell of the New York Stock Exchange on Thursday. The ETNs are senior unsecured unsubordinated debt. Barbara Byrne, vice chairman in investment banking at Barclays, said she believes the ETNs will ser

The battleground between Argentina and its holdout creditors shifted from U.S. courts to the court of public opinion as both sides took out full-page advertisements to argue their cases in the world's major newspapers. Just what can be gained from the ads, which appeared worldwide, remains to be seen given Argentina lost its legal case on June 16 when the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear an Argentine appeal, letting stand a lower court's order that it pay holdout creditors $1.33 billion plus accrued interest. Hundreds of thousands of dollars, perhaps over $1 million combined from both sides, has been spent on ads in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times and the Washington Post in the last three weeks. Both sides have met with a court-appointed mediator in hopes of structuring a deal before a July 30 deadline, but they have not met face-to-face. Argentina's Economy Minister Axel Kicillof has made speeches at the United Nations and in Washi

Aereo, the video streaming service which sought to provide an alternative to traditional television broadcasters, said it believes it can still operate despite a crippling U.S. Supreme Court ruling that caused the company to suspend service, according to a court filing on Wednesday. _0"> The Supreme Court last month said Aereo violated copyright law by using tiny antennas to broadcast TV content online to paying subscribers. The decision was a victory for traditional broadcasters, such as CBS Corp, Comcast Corp's NBC, Walt Disney Co's ABC, and Twenty-First Century Fox Inc's Fox. After the ruling, Aereo announced that it was suspending service, and litigation in a related case involving the company resumed in a Manhattan federal court. CBS argued in a joint filing on Wednesday that the case should be dismissed in light of the Supreme Court ruling, but Aereo disagreed. "Although Aereo has temporarily suspended operations, Aereo believes that it can still o