Hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of gold has been exported from Israel to North Korea despite a U.N. ban, an Israeli parliamentary committee said Thursday.

The Knesset's economics committee said it would tighten restrictions on trade with the authoritarian state after learning that $400,000 of gold was exported after a 2006 U.N. ban.

The aviation industry is set to post a second consecutive year of net profits in 2015, nearly doubling them to $33 billion (30.1 billion) thanks to low fuel prices, its trade association said Thursday.

"Our outlook for this year has improved to a 33 billion U.S. dollars net profit," said Tony Tyler, head of the International Air Transport Association.

Spanish global clothing giant Inditex, owner of the Zara brand, posted Thursday a 20-percent surge in nine-month net profits thanks to higher sales as the economy in its home market Spain improves.

The group said in a statement that net profit rose to 2.0 billion euros ($2.2 billion) between February and October.

Chedid Re, a multi-awarded leading regional Reinsurance broker announced the opening of a new office in Casablanca Finance City, as part of an expansion strategy enhancing the company’s presence in North and West Africa.

The CEO of CFCA, Saïd Ibrahimi was pleased to welcome a first reinsurance broker within CFC's ecosystem. "The presence of Chedid Re among other international partners strengthens the role of CFC as an economic and financial platform and a Pan-African reinsurance hub » he said.

Turkey's economy grew 4.0 percent in the third quarter of 2015 from the same period last year, statistics showed on Thursday, beating expectations and showing the economy in better shape than previously assumed.

The figures mean that the economy grew 3.4 percent in the first nine months of 2015, compared with an overall growth rate of 2.9 percent in 2014, the statistics office said in a statement.

Energy giant Royal Dutch Shell on Thursday refused to rule out closing its New Zealand operations after more than a century as it announced a review of its operations in the country.

The news comes as energy giants around the world scale back operations and investments in the face of a plunge in commodities prices that has sent a chill through stock markets.

Share prices of Samsung Electronics and some of its key affiliates rose Thursday after the company unveiled a plan to develop components for self-driving cars, entering a market eyed by rivals including Apple.

The new automotive component team will "focus on building its competencies in infotainment and autonomous driving vehicles", the South Korean electronics giant said in its annual business reorganization plan announced Wednesday.

Embattled German auto giant Volkswagen is due to provide an update Thursday on the latest developments in the massive pollution-cheating storm it has been engulfed in since September.

Matthias Mueller -- the man brought in to steer the company out of a crisis that is expected to cost it countless billions of euros and has left the reputation of the former paragon of German industry in tatters -- is scheduled to field questions from the world's media at a news conference in VW's headquarters in Wolfsburg, northern Germany.

Australia's unemployment rate dropped for the second-straight month in November, data showed Thursday, signaling an improvement in the domestic economy even as concern grows about a slowdown in the nation's largest trading partner China.

The jobless rate was a seasonally adjusted 5.8 percent in November, down from 5.9 percent the previous month and 6.2 percent in September, the Australian Bureau of Statistics said.

South Korea's central bank left its benchmark interest rate unchanged at a record low of 1.5 percent for a sixth consecutive month Thursday, ahead of an anticipated rate increase by the US Federal Reserve.

The decision had been widely expected with the Bank of Korea's (BOK) board members adopting a wait and see approach to the impact of an eventual Fed hike on the global economy.