As the year-end giving season reaches a critical period, news agencies from around the world are reporting on charitable gift giving and other holiday stories of philanthropy.

The popularity of charity gift cards is the focus of two reports, in The Washington Post and the Associated Press.

Despite the recession, some companies have not scaled back their charitable giving this season, and several are featured in a column by the Washington Post business writer Steven Pearlstein.

Companies that have forgone the traditional holiday party so that money could be given to charity instead are the focus of stories in USA Today and The Washington Post.

In England, fund raisers planning this year’s gala events are lowering expectations, reports The Financial Times. In at least one case, a lack of corporate sponsorship led to the British Red Cross canceling its Christmas ball fund raiser.

Meanwhile, the New York Times columnist Nicholas D. Kristof compares European and American charitable giving in his latest column, as well as the charitable acts of this country’s conservatives and liberals. He calls on liberals — which research has shown tend to be stingier in the charity department — to “redeem yourselves” this season.

And in Florida, an unstingy act: For the third year in a row, an anonymous donor left a coin worth nearly $1,000 in a Salvation Army kettle, reports All Things Considered on National Public Radio.

(Free registration is required to view the Washington Post, Financial Times, and New York Times articles and the AP article on the Washington Post site.)