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DETROIT (AP) -- Chrysler LLC's U.S. sales fell 47 percent in May, but the company says being under bankruptcy protection did little to deter customers from purchasing its vehicles.

Chrysler said Tuesday it sold 79,010 cars and light trucks last month. The company said its sales were pulled lower because it didn't sell any cars to fleet buyers like rental car companies, but its retail sales to individual buyers were the best they've been all year.

With 789 dealers set to stop selling the company's cars next week, many of those purchases were fueled by deep discounts.

DETROIT (AP) -- General Motors Corp. took a key step toward its downsizing on Tuesday, striking a tentative deal to sell its Hummer brand to a Chinese manufacturer, while also revealing that it has potential buyers for its Saturn and Saab brands.

China's Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery Co. said Tuesday afternoon that it reached an agreement to acquire the brand from GM for an undisclosed ammount. The Detroit automaker had announced Tuesday morning that it had a memorandum of understanding to sell the brand of rugged SUVs, but it didn't identify the buyer.

Sichuan Tengzhong deals in road construction, plastics, resins and other industrial products, but Hummer would be its first step into the automotive business.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The number of U.S. homebuyers who agreed to buy a previously occupied home took the largest monthly jump in nearly eight years in April, but there are still plenty of danger signs for the U.S. housing market.

Home sales appear likely to head upward this summer, potentially to levels not seen since the stock market collapsed last autumn, but prices are expected to keep falling well into next year.

The National Association of Realtors said Tuesday its seasonally adjusted index of sales contracts signed in April surged 6.7 percent to 90.3, far exceeding analysts' forecasts. It was the biggest monthly jump since October 2001, when pending sales rose 9.2 percent.

NEW YORK (AP) -- Investors slowed their move into the market from a sprint to a walk.

Stocks tacked on modest gains Tuesday to extend a rally to a fourth day following a strong rise in pending home sales, the latest encouraging signal for the troubled housing market.

The Dow Jones industrial average briefly pushed into the black for 2009 but ended 35.5 points below the break-even mark. In March, the blue chips were down more than 2,200 points, or 25.4 percent, for the year.

The Dow rose 19.43, or 0.2 percent, to 8,740.87. The index at times traded above 8,776.39, its finish for 2008. While it remains down moderately for the year, the Dow is up 5.3 percent in four days, its best run since early April.

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP) -- Oil prices briefly passed $69 per barrel Tuesday in a weeklong rally that appears short on fundamentals, yet exceedingly full of momentum.

Average retail gasoline prices continued to march upward: A gallon now costs about 46 cents more than it did a month ago.

After peaking at $69.05 Tuesday afternoon, a price not seen since early November, benchmark crude for July delivery fell 3 cents to settle at $68.55 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

There have been a few indications that the economy is mending in some of the hardest hit sectors.

BEIJING (AP) -- The global economy is showing "early signs of stabilization" due to action by the United States and China to end its worst slump in decades, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said Tuesday.

The two governments announced they would launch new high-level talks the week of July 27, reviving a dialogue carried on under the former U.S. administration and broadening the agenda to include foreign policy concerns.

Geithner said that in two days of talks, Chinese officials recognized the need to move aggressively to revive growth and stabilize the banking system even at the cost of higher U.S. government budget deficits.

NEW YORK (AP) -- Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan Chase & Co. and American Express Co. moved closer to repaying government bailout money, announcing a series of new stock sales.

The stock offers disclosed late Monday and Tuesday are a precondition for the financial companies to pay back loans received under the Troubled Asset Relief Program last fall. The Treasury Department is expected to announce next week the first group of banks that will be allowed to repay the money.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Losses at U.S. thrifts narrowed considerably in the first quarter, but the number of institutions in trouble increased, the Office of Thrift Supervision said Tuesday.

Thrifts lost $47 million in the quarter ending March 31, their best performance since September 2007. That compared with losses of $5.4 billion in the fourth quarter and $617 million in the year-earlier period.

But the number of "problem thrifts" increased to 31 from 26 in the previous quarter and troubled assets made up more of their portfolios.

BALTIMORE (AP) -- Many states that are cutting spending on schools, roads and other basics have been lavishing hundreds of millions of dollars in incentives on Hollywood studios to lure TV and movie productions -- this, despite scant evidence that taxpayers come out ahead on such deals.

An Associated Press survey found that states competing for projects handed out $1.8 billion in tax breaks and other advantages to the entertainment industry from 2006 through 2008.

Several states have even sweetened their incentives recently or are considering doing so, for fear that if they don't land the next major motion picture, someone else will.

LONDON (AP) -- A major Middle Eastern shareholder in Barclays PLC made a 1.5 billion pound ($2.5 billion) profit Tuesday by selling part of the stake it picked up in the British bank just seven months ago to help it avoid a government bailout.

International Petroleum Investment Company of Abu Dhabi sold more than 1.3 billion Barclays shares for 265 pence each, raising about 3.46 billion pounds, according to Credit Suisse Group AG, which handled the sale.

The Standard & Poor's 500 index rose 1.87, or 0.2 percent, to 944.74, and the Nasdaq composite index rose 8.12, or 0.4 percent, to 1,836.80.

Benchmark crude for July delivery fell 3 cents to settle at $68.55 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

In other Nymex trading, gasoline for June delivery rose less than a penny to settle at $1.9252 a gallon and heating oil rose 1.24 cents to settle at $1.7979 a gallon. Natural gas for June delivery slid 12.9 cents to settle at $4.12 per 1,000 cubic feet.

In London, Brent prices rose 20 cents to settle at $68.17 a barrel on the ICE Futures exchange.

AP Business Highlights

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