IN BRIEF (Page 16)

French jobs warning

French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde predicted that the job market won't improve soon after France's unemployment rate rose more than expected to a 2-year high.

The jobless rate rose to 9.1 percent from a revised 8 percent in the fourth quarter of 2008, Insee, the country's economic statistics office, said yesterday. Economists expected joblessness to increase to 8.6 percent, according to the median of eight estimates in a Bloomberg News survey.