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Dell 2Q profit rises, revenue misses view
Aug 11 2005 11:57PM (CT)
DALLAS (AP) - Low-priced laptops and other bargain systems cramped Dell Inc.'s second-quarter revenues and the company's CEO said the computer leader had pushed too aggressively for market share.
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Fed chairman inspires Virginia painter
Aug 11 2005 11:54PM (CT)
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) - An artist looking to make some cash before graduate school is causing a stir with her oil paintings of Alan Greenspan, some bought by fans of the Federal Reserve chairman sight unseen.
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Ex-WorldCom CFO gets five years in prison
Aug 11 2005 11:34PM (CT)
NEW YORK (AP) - Former WorldCom finance chief Scott Sullivan was sentenced Thursday to five years in prison by a judge who called him "the architect" of the company's epic fraud _ but gave him a break because he helped convict his onetime boss, CEO Bernard Ebbers.
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Japan approves tariffs on U.S. steel
Aug 11 2005 11:09PM (CT)
TOKYO (AP) - Japan's Cabinet on Friday formally approved a decision to impose 15 percent retaliatory tariffs on U.S. steel imports, the government said.
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Japan's economy grew 0.3 pct. April-June
Aug 11 2005 10:52PM (CT)
TOKYO (AP) - Japan's economy grew for the third straight quarter _ yet more evidence of a long-awaited turnaround in the world's second-largest economy _ as consumers spent more, exports boomed and companies increased capital investment.
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Japanese stocks grow 0.04 percent
Aug 11 2005 10:47PM (CT)
TOKYO (AP) - Japanese stocks rose Friday morning, continuing their climb from a 4-year high as the government announced that Japan's economy grew 0.3 percent in the April-June quarter. The dollar was lower against the yen.
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Merck scientist testifies on safety risk
Aug 11 2005 9:02PM (CT)
ANGLETON, Texas (AP) - Merck & Co.'s head of clinical trials testified in the nation's first Vioxx-related civil trial Thursday that consumers would have no new drugs if all safety risks had to be eliminated first.
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Carriers raise domestic fares, citing fuel
Aug 11 2005 8:44PM (CT)
CHICAGO (AP) - Several U.S. airlines moved to raise domestic fares by $10 to $20 per round trip as oil prices resumed their upward trek Thursday, reaching the highest level in more than two decades.
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Red Robin CEO ousted after internal probe
Aug 11 2005 8:32PM (CT)
GREENWOOD VILLAGE, Colo. (AP) - Red Robin Gourmet Burgers Inc. dismissed its CEO on Thursday after the restaurant chain said an internal probe had determined he misused charter airplanes and corporate expense accounts.
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Belize discovers oil, secures well
Aug 11 2005 7:30PM (CT)
MEXICO CITY (AP) - Belize has struck oil. After years of fruitless petroleum exploration by international companies, a private local concern, Belize Natural Energy Limited, and a partner company from Denver have secured a well that since July 30 has been producing an estimated 500 barrels of Grade 38 API sweet light crude oil a day, one of the company's directors, Sheila McCaffrey, confirmed Thursday.
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7-Eleven settles dispute over tobacco
Aug 11 2005 7:19PM (CT)
DALLAS (AP) - Convenience-store leader 7-Eleven Inc., the nation's largest retailer of tobacco products, has agreed to toughen its procedures to catch underage shoppers who try to buy tobacco products.
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British Airways cancels Heathrow flights
Aug 11 2005 7:13PM (CT)
LONDON (AP) - British Airways canceled all long- and short-haul flights due to depart from London's Heathrow airport Thursday afternoon and diverted arriving flights, after an industrial dispute escalated.
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PepsiCo to change Tropicana drinks' labels
Aug 11 2005 6:59PM (CT)
NEW YORK (AP) - PepsiCo Inc. has agreed to change the labels on its Tropicana Peach Papaya and Strawberry Melon drinks, settling a lawsuit that claimed the products' "real fruit juice" descriptions were misleading.
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Northwest to fly without union mechanics
Aug 11 2005 6:53PM (CT)
EAGAN, Minn. (AP) - Northwest Airlines Corp. has 1,500 replacement workers and managers ready to take over for its union mechanics if they strike on Aug. 20, company executives said Thursday as they detailed their strike plans.
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DreamWorks swings to second-quarter loss
Aug 11 2005 6:27PM (CT)
LOS ANGELES (AP) - DreamWorks Animation SKG Inc. swung to a loss in the second quarter, although the results posted Thursday were slightly better than the bleak fiscal picture the studio outlined last month.
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AIG shareholders approve 15 board members
Aug 11 2005 6:03PM (CT)
NEW YORK (AP) - Shareholders in the American International Group Inc. on Thursday approved the insurance company's slate of 15 board members and renewed the auditing contract of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, despite opposition from some major institutional investors.
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Intercepted e-mail indictment revived
Aug 11 2005 5:39PM (CT)
BOSTON (AP) - A federal appeals court Thursday revived the government's online eavesdropping prosecution against an executive of a company that offered e-mail service and surreptitiously tracked its subscribers' messages.
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Money funds fall in latest week
Aug 11 2005 5:29PM (CT)
NEW YORK (AP) - Assets of the nation's retail money market mutual funds fell by $1.12 billion in the latest week to $808.52 billion, the Investment Company Institute said Thursday.
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Some Yum restaurants going smoke-free
Aug 11 2005 5:18PM (CT)
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) - People digging into chicken dinners or munching slices of pizza soon won't be allowed to light up cigarettes at company-owned KFC and Pizza Hut restaurants.
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Banker admits fraud that cheated gov't
Aug 11 2005 4:58PM (CT)
NEW YORK (AP) - A government probe of illegal tax shelters for the rich resulted in a guilty plea Thursday by a New York banker who admitted he helped cheat the government out of millions of dollars in tax revenues by promoting phony tax shelters.
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Treasurys up steeply after strong auction
Aug 11 2005 4:52PM (CT)
NEW YORK (AP) - Treasurys exited active trade Thursday higher after a strong auction of 10-year notes and to a lesser extent a soft retail sales report.
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Advisers studying Banca Popolare options
Aug 11 2005 4:39PM (CT)
ROME (AP) - Banca Popolare Italiana Scarl, the Italian bank embroiled in a probe of their takeover bid for Banca Antonveneta SpA, on Thursday named advisers to study its options for its stake, and put its own net worth at more than 4 billion euros (nearly $5 billion).
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Thursday's Commodities Roundup
Aug 11 2005 4:31PM (CT)
NEW YORK (AP) - Oil prices briefly hit a record $66 a barrel Thursday as refinery outages proliferated and supply worries grew.
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Ex-Rite Aid CEO's sentence cut by a year
Aug 11 2005 4:26PM (CT)
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) - A federal judge on Thursday trimmed a year from former Rite Aid Corp. chief executive Martin L. Grass' eight-year sentence for conspiring to obstruct justice and to defraud the nation's third-largest drugstore chain and its shareholders.
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Target's 2Q profit falls, beats estimates
Aug 11 2005 4:18PM (CT)
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) - Upscale discounter Target Corp. posted profits sharply below last year, when it sold a department store chain, but robust sales carried its results ahead of Wall Street estimates despite higher gasoline prices.
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U.S. to seek textile deal with China
Aug 11 2005 4:12PM (CT)
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Bush administration, struggling to deal with America's surging trade deficit with China, announced Thursday it would begin negotiations aimed at broad restrictions on imports of Chinese clothing and textiles.
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Pfizer sets guidelines on its advertising
Aug 11 2005 3:46PM (CT)
NEW YORK (AP) - Pfizer Inc. pledged not to directly promote any new product to patients for at least six months after putting it on the market and to target only adult audiences when touting impotency treatment Viagra on TV.
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IPOs of Refco, Heartland show early gains
Aug 11 2005 3:43PM (CT)
WASHINGTON (AP) - Two new public companies surged in their first day of trading Thursday, while a third received a more muted reception from the market.
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Qualcomm to buy Flarion in $600M deal
Aug 11 2005 3:40PM (CT)
SAN DIEGO (AP) - Qualcomm Inc. has agreed to acquire privately held Flarion Technologies for $600 million in cash and stock, in a deal that will expand its wireless-technology offerings.
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Chrysler introduces Dodge Ram Mega Cab
Aug 11 2005 2:05PM (CT)
SALTILLO, Mexico (AP) - Workers at DaimlerChrysler AG's Saltillo plant got a visit from Chrysler Group's future president and Mexican government officials Thursday as they began building the 2006 Dodge Ram Mega Cab, a behemoth that Chrysler is counting on to boost sales in the growing pickup market.
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Biotech companies settle royalties suit
Aug 11 2005 1:29PM (CT)
BOSTON (AP) - Cambridge-based biotechnology companies Genzyme Corp. and Biogen Idec Inc. have settled their lawsuit against Columbia University over the school's rights to royalties on drug-making research from the 1970s.
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Brazil Senate approves minimum wage hike
Aug 11 2005 1:10PM (CT)
SAO PAULO, Brazil (AP) - In a big defeat for President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Brazil's Senate has approved a 28 percent minimum wage hike that would heap mountains of debt on the strained coffers of Latin America's largest country.
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Pollution suit brought against power firms
Aug 11 2005 12:11PM (CT)
NEW YORK (AP) - Residents of Ontario, Canada, have brought a lawsuit against 13 major U.S. and Canadian power companies seeking $50 billion to compensate them for alleged pollution damage from the companies' power plants.
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Mortgage rates increase again this week
Aug 11 2005 11:59AM (CT)
WASHINGTON (AP) - Mortgage rates rose again this week with 30-year mortgages hitting their highest level in four months and one-year adjustable rate mortgages rising to the highest level in more than three years.
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Unions to end S. Africa mining strike
Aug 11 2005 11:16AM (CT)
CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) - The two unions representing 90,000 striking South African gold miners agreed Thursday to accept management's latest offer and return to work, ending the worst strike in 18 years in the world's largest gold-producing nation.
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China trade surplus rises to $50 billion
Aug 11 2005 10:43AM (CT)
SHANGHAI, China (AP) - China's cumulative trade surplus for the year rose to $50 billion in July, far exceeding the $32 billion surplus for all of 2004, as tighter credit and spending policies bit into the growth in imports, the government reported Thursday.
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Ex-FCC head joins private-equity firm
Aug 11 2005 10:41AM (CT)
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) - Former Federal Communications Commission Chairman Michael K. Powell has joined Providence Equity Partners, a private-equity company focused on investing in media and communications companies, the investment firm said Thursday.
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Carlsberg 2Q earnings nearly triple
Aug 11 2005 10:18AM (CT)
COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) - Carlsberg A/S, the world's fifth-largest brewer, said Thursday that second-quarter profit almost tripled, partly due to improved earnings in Eastern Europe.
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TOM Online 2Q profit rises 0.9 percent
Aug 11 2005 9:56AM (CT)
HONG KONG (AP) - TOM Online Inc., one of China's largest Internet companies, said Thursday its second-quarter profit rose 0.9 percent on increases in its wireless Internet revenues.
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Spanish police shut down movie Web site
Aug 11 2005 9:45AM (CT)
MADRID, Spain (AP) - A Web site that let users exchange pirated moves has been shut down and its four creators have been arrested, Spanish police said Thursday.
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Cos. look to sidestep new bankruptcy code
Aug 11 2005 9:43AM (CT)
NEW YORK (AP) - U.S. companies heading for bankruptcy may be filing sooner than expected this fall in order to sidestep tough new revisions in the bankruptcy code that take effect Oct. 17.
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EU, euro-zone economies grow 0.3 percent
Aug 11 2005 9:32AM (CT)
BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP) - Economic growth in the European Union as a whole and the euro zone nations that use the euro currency slowed to 0.3 percent in the second quarter, the EU said Thursday, but growth in the 12 nations using the common currency is expected to pick up by the end of the year.
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Aegon posts 71 percent rise in 2Q profit
Aug 11 2005 9:10AM (CT)
AMSTERDAM, Netherlands (AP) - The Dutch insurance company Aegon NV posted a 71 percent increase in second-quarter profits Thursday, reporting a surge in investments and strong advances in its North American business.
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Telstra Corp. posts record annual profit
Aug 11 2005 8:46AM (CT)
CANBERRA, Australia (AP) - Australia's largest telecommunications company Telstra Corp. posted its best ever annual profit Thursday, but its shares fell after it warned that earnings in the current year would likely decline due to intensifying competition.
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Germany's Duerr says CEO stepping down
Aug 11 2005 7:39AM (CT)
FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) - Duerr AG, which supplies painting and assembly systems for automakers, said Thursday its chief executive is stepping down and that it plans to cut up to 800 jobs, most of them in North America.
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Ex-Bayer execs indicted for price fixing
Aug 11 2005 7:30AM (CT)
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - A federal grand jury indicted two former executives at German chemical maker Bayer AG for allegedly taking part in an international price-fixing scheme that drove up the costs of rubber chemicals used to make shoes, tires and other products, authorities said.
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Hannover Re 2Q profit up on lower taxes
Aug 11 2005 7:05AM (CT)
FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) - Hannover Re AG posted a 6 percent gain in second-quarter net profit Thursday, citing increased earnings from premiums, lower taxes and fewer claims related to natural disasters.
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Deutsche Telekom 2Q profit up 63 percent
Aug 11 2005 6:35AM (CT)
FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) - Deutsche Telekom AG posted a 63 percent gain in second-quarter net profit Thursday, lifted by growth at its wireless operations in Germany and the United States and demand for high-speed Internet access.
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Japan ratifies 1986 Asbestos Convention
Aug 11 2005 6:22AM (CT)
TOKYO (AP) - Japan ratified on Thursday the 1986 Asbestos Convention banning certain forms of asbestos, amid growing concern over exposure to the cancer-causing material.
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German economy stagnates in second quarter
Aug 11 2005 6:04AM (CT)
BERLIN (AP) - The German economy, Europe's largest, stagnated in the second quarter, official figures showed Thursday, in a drag on the continent and embattled German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder.
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Italian economy climbs out of recession
Aug 11 2005 5:38AM (CT)
ROME (AP) - The Italian economy climbed out of recession in the second quarter, growing an unexpected 0.7 percent from the first quarter and marking its sharpest rise since the first quarter of 2001, according to preliminary data released Thursday.
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ING Groep posts 6.7 percent drop in 2Q
Aug 11 2005 5:31AM (CT)
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) - Dutch bank and insurer ING Groep NV reported a 6.7 percent drop in second-quarter earnings Thursday, with a sharp decline in its insurance activities offsetting banking gains.
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Japanese stocks surge to four-year high
Aug 11 2005 5:10AM (CT)
TOKYO (AP) - Japanese stocks surged to a four-year high Thursday amid growing optimism about the nation's economic resurgence and confidence that Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's push for reforms will succeed.
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New Ill. laws aim to stop farm vandalism
Aug 11 2005 4:12AM (CT)
SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) - Gov. Rod Blagojevich is sending a message to anyone who might think it's fun to mess with a farmer's combine or ramrod through cornfields on an all-terrain vehicle: Don't even think about it. The governor signed two bills Tuesday aimed at stopping vandalism on farms. Both laws took effect immediately.
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Companies embrace golf tournament scene
Aug 11 2005 3:26AM (CT)
SPRINGFIELD, N.J. (AP) - More than ever, the PGA tour looks like a traveling circus, with giant tents sprouting on the manicured courses where professional golfers have their tournaments. These tents, however, shelter lions of industry, not acrobats and tigers.
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Drought forces barges to lighten loads
Aug 11 2005 3:25AM (CT)
ST. LOUIS (AP) - As the Midwest's worst drought in 17 years continues to lower inland rivers, Larry Daily and other barge operators shake their heads at sunny skies and hope for rain _ lots of it _ to buoy their cargos, spirits and bottom lines.
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Unocal shareholders OK Chevron takeover
Aug 11 2005 3:24AM (CT)
LOS ANGELES (AP) - When Unocal Corp. Chief Executive Chuck Williamson first discussed a possible sale to Chinese oil and gas company CNOOC Ltd. last December, he and his CNOOC counterpart, Fu Chengyu, knew there would be political repercussions. What they didn't count on was the firestorm that would eventually scuttle any deal between the two companies and clear the way for Chevron Corp. to buy Unocal in a stock and cash deal valued at approximately $18 billion.
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Murdoch plans major Internet expansion
Aug 11 2005 2:27AM (CT)
NEW YORK (AP) - Rupert Murdoch, the chairman and CEO of News Corp., said Wednesday he plans to make several more acquisitions of online businesses in the coming months as his global media conglomerate makes the Internet a "major part" of its future growth.
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Pilots file grievance against Northwest
Aug 11 2005 2:27AM (CT)
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) - Union pilots filed a complaint with Northwest Airlines Corp. after the carrier used a charter company Wednesday for two scheduled Northwest flights.
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Suit accuses Ameritrade of delaying trades
Aug 11 2005 2:26AM (CT)
LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) - Online broker Ameritrade is being accused of costing investors $100 million by delaying orders to buy and sell stock. A class-action lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court alleges that Omaha-based Ameritrade Holding Corp. in one instance took more than an hour to execute a trade, costing an investor more than $26,000.
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Whirlpool raises Maytag offer to $1.79B
Aug 11 2005 2:22AM (CT)
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) - Whirlpool Corp. moved more aggressively Wednesday to clinch the deal to buy rival Maytag Corp. by raising its offer for a third time to $1.79 billion, or $21 a share.
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Japan's current account surplus contracts
Aug 11 2005 1:05AM (CT)
TOKYO (AP) - Japan's current account surplus contracted 15.3 percent in June from a year earlier as rising oil prices inflated import bills, the government said Thursday.
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No time to lose for Ruby Tuesday
Aug 11 2005 12:22AM (CT)
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) - When Sandy Beall named his first restaurant "Ruby Tuesday" after the popular Rolling Stones song, he probably didn't pay much attention to these lyrics:
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Korean Air reports $41.9 million 2Q loss
Aug 11 2005 12:19AM (CT)
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - Korean Air Inc., South Korea's largest airline, on Thursday said it posted a second-quarter net loss because of soaring fuel costs.
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