European regulators have approved Emerson's planned $1.5 billion acquisition of British power supply company Chloride Group.
The European Commission said it concluded that the acquisition would not significantly impede effective competition.
"The merged entity would continue to face strong competition from a number of credible competitors in all national markets affected by the concentration," the panel said in a statement Tuesday. "Therefore, the commission concluded that the proposed transaction does not raise competition concerns."
Emerson and Chloride both provide uninterruptible power supply systems for computers and hospitals.
Emerson Chairman, President and Chief Executive David Farr said he wants to invest in faster-growth areas, such as network power, and divest of businesses that aren't growing as rapidly low interest personal loan.
Last week, Emerson announced a deal to sell its motors and appliance controls businesses to Kyoto, Japan-based Nidec Corp. for $700 million.
On Monday, Emerson said it planned to sell LANDesk Software, a Salt Lake City IT systems manager, to private equity investment firm Thoma Bravo.
Emerson (NYSE:EMR) is the second-largest public company in St. Louis with $20.9 billion in revenue in 2009. It has 129,000 employees companywide, including 1,400 in St. Louis after the motors business sale closes next month.
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Mortgage rates continued to decline this week, plunging to the lowest level in decades, according to surveys from Freddie Mac and Bankrate.
Freddie Mac’s weekly report said the 30-year fixed rate slipped to 4.44% for the week ended Thursday, the lowest since the government-backed lender began tracking the rate in 1971. Last week’s rates stood at 4.49%, and a year ago it was at 5.29%.
The 15-year fixed rate fell to 3.92% this week, the lowest since Freddie Mac began tracking it 1991, down from 3.95% last week and from 4.68% a year ago.
Adjustable-rate mortgages also declined, with the 5-year rate falling to 3.56% this week, the lowest since 2005 when the lender began tracking it.
Mortgage tracker Bankrate.com, which surveys large lenders across the country, said the average 30-year fixed loan sank to a record low for the fourth consecutive week, falling to 4.57% from 4.66% the previous week.
The 15-year fixed rate, which is a popular option for refinancing, also fell to the lowest level in the history of Bankrate’s 25-year old survey, dipping to 4.06%, from 4.11% the week before.
While the 1-year adjustable-rate mortgage held steady at 4.8% for a fourth week, the 5-year adjustable rate mortgage dropped to a record low of 3.92% from 3.95% the previous week.
"Low rates are helping to heal many battered local housing markets by increasing home-purchase activity, said Frank Nothaft, chief economist at Freddie Mac.
Mortgage rate applications inched up a modest 0.6% during the week, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. Applications for purchase rose 0.3% while refinance applications increased 0.6%.
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Consumers are more willing to spend money online again, after a year of lackluster results.
Reston-based Internet tracking firm comScore says retail e-commerce sales reached $32.9 billion in the second quarter, up 9 percent from a year ago.
The total does not include online travel, auctions, autos or large corporate purchases.
It marks the third straight quarterly gain in year-over-year online sales, after a year of flat or falling quarterly e-commerce totals. Retail sales fell for the first time ever in the fourth quarter of 2008, and declined in both the second and third quarters of 2009.
“The second quarter’s continuation of the first quarter’s strong retail e-commerce growth rates is encouraging,” said comScore (NASDAQ: SCOR) chairman Gian Fulgoni one hour payday loan. “We remain optimistic heading into the second half of the year, but we will be keeping a close eye on unemployment rates, which along with potential uncertainty in the stock market could limit growth in e-commerce spending in the near term.”
Upper income households, or those with annual incomes of $100,000 or more, spent 17 percent more shopping online than they did a year ago, nearly twice overall e-commerce growth last quarter.
Electronics, computers and software, books and magazines were among the biggest sellers online last quarter.
Tiny Maywood, Calif., laid off every single one of its city employees on Wednesday.
But that doesn’t mean the city is closing up shop. City Hall will still be open, as will Maywood’s park and recreation center. Police will continue to patrol the streets.
They just won’t be staffed by Maywood employees. The city can’t have any staff because it can’t get liability or worker’s compensation insurance for them. Maywood’s carrier, the California Joint Powers Insurance Authority, dropped it earlier this month in part because of several police-related claims.
Instead of declaring bankruptcy, Maywood officials decided to outsource all city functions. The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department will patrol the streets, while the neighboring city of Bell will cover other city functions, such as staffing City Hall.
Maywood already relies on contract workers and outsources many city services. The director of parks and recreation, for instance, is a contractor, and the city’s lights, landscaping and street sweeping are handled by private companies. Los Angeles County maintains the library and fire department.
Some of Maywood’s 96 employees — which include 41 police officers — will also continue as contract workers. Elected officials, such as the city council and the city clerk, will remain on the job in the 1.5-square-mile municipality, which has about 45,000 residents.
"Odds are residents will see the same faces as in years past, just under a different administrative process," said Magdalena Prado, the city’s community relations director, who is a contract worker and is keeping her post.
Maywood is billing itself as the first American city to outsource all of its city services. In an odd twist, officials say it can provide even better services because the shift will help it save money and close a $450,000 shortfall in its $10 million general fund budget.
For instance, the contract with the sheriff’s department costs about half of the more than $7 million spent annually to maintain the Maywood police department, Prado said check cash advance. And patrols will be increased.
"Our community will continue to receive quality services," Mayor Ana Rosa Riso said in a statement. "Maywood’s streets will continue to be swept, our summer park programs will continue to operate and our waste will be collected and hauled as scheduled."
Stressed cities
A growing number of cities are looking to contract out or share services regionally as the economic downturn takes its toll on municipal budgets.
"Everything is on the table," said Chris Hoene, research director at the National League of Cities. "The fiscal stress cities are feeling mean they are looking for alternative options to deliver services that cost less money."
Some 7 in 10 city officials said they are cutting personnel to balances their budgets, while another 68% are holding off on capital projects, according to a survey the league did in May. More than half of respondents say they will make to further slash city services next year if taxes or fees are not raised.
Not everyone is distressed by Maywood’s unusual plan for providing city services. While Jesus Padilla feels sorry for the workers being affected, he thinks things might improve. He’s made lots of calls to the county sheriff’s department when he worked as a security guard and said officers always responded promptly.
"The council made the best decision it could," said Padilla, a local activist who has lived in Maywood for more than 30 years. "It’s going to be good for the city and the citizens."
Energy efficiency group PECI landed a $749,153 sliver of the $76 million in stimulus funding announced Friday by the U.S. Department of Energy for more energy efficient buildings.
Portland-based PECI’s award was one of 13 educational grants under the program. It will pay for a PECI team to revise and develop curriculum to train commercial building auditors and operators, who in turn will make sure that buildings are as energy efficient as possible.
The total cost of the PECI curriculum project is $1.5 million, according to the project outline released by the U.S. Department of Energy.
In all 58 projects received funding in the Friday announcement, all of the money going toward improved efficiency — from the development of better insulation to the testing of advanced building controls.
“Energy-efficient commercial buildings will help our country cut its carbon emissions and energy costs while the training programs will upgrade the skills of the current workforce and attract the next generation to careers in the emerging clean-energy economy,” said U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu in a news release.
PECI, originally Portland Energy Conservation Inc., is a nonprofit that helps businesses with energy efficiency.
The University of Texas said it won’t join the Pacific-10 Conference, dealing a blow to efforts to grow conference influence and revenue.
Texas said Monday it will say in the Big 12 Conference, USA Today reported.
The news appears to dampen expectations of a seismic shift in the college sports landscape. After Nebraska officially left the Big 12 last week, the Texas Longhorns, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Texas Tech and Texas A&M were expected to finalize plans to join the Pac-10 and create a 16-team conference.
The University of Colorado last week said it will join the Pac-10, leaving the Big 12 Conference.
The Pacific-10 seeks to grow revenues in an increasingly cutthroat world of big-time college sports bad credit payday advance.
Although a winner with its teams on the field, the conference is a laggard in revenues. The Pac-10 reported $96 million in revenue last year. That trails all but one of the major collegiate conferences, despite having prominent schools like the University of California, Los Angeles; University of Southern California; Cal and Stanford, which have traditions of football and basketball success.
Recently the Pac-10 hired Creative Artists Agency to advise on expansion and on upcoming broadcast negotiations. The conference’s agreements with ESPN and Fox expire after the 2011-12 school year.
The Federal Trade Commission is expected to vote Wednesday on approval of Google Inc.'s proposed $750 million acquisition of AdMob Inc.
TechCrunch cited an unnamed source it said has been briefed on the matter that the vote is coming on Wednesday and that Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) is prepared to fight in court if the deal is blocked by the FTC.
The Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg have reported that the FTC was seen leaning towards such action. On Tuesday night the Journal reported that the agency is concerned that the deal will reduce the mobile in-application advertising market from three to just two key players: Google and rival Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL).
The FTC last month said it was seeking sworn declarations from Google’s competitors and advertisers, a sign taken to mean that it was lining up opposition to the sale.
The Journal said some of its unnamed sources complain that analysis of the mobile ad network is too narrow, not including players such as Millennial Media Inc., Greystripe Inc., Jumptap Inc., or on a broader level Yahoo Inc. (NASDAQ:YHOO) and Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ:MSFT).
Procter & Gamble Co. and Kroger Co. topped the list of eight Greater Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky firms that made repeat appearances on the Fortune 500 list this year, joined by insurance/financial services firm American Financial Group.
Fortune ranks companies based on annual revenue. Walmart Stores ranked at No. 1, with $408 billion in revenues.
P&G ranked 22nd, down from 20th in 2009, with $79.7 billion in revenue versus $83.5 billion last year; and Kroger ranked 23rd, down from 22 last year, with $76.7 billion in revenues, up from $76 billion a year ago.
Other firms on the list included:
• Macy’s Inc. at 103, down from 98, with $23.5 billion in revenues, down from $25 billion last year;
• Fifth Third Bancorp at 248, up from 302, with $9 on line pay day loans.5 billion, up from $8.6 billion;
• Ashland Inc. at 280, up from 310, with $8.1 billion, down from $8.4 billion;
• Omnicare at 347, up from 392, with $6.2 billion, down from $6.3 billion;
• Western & Southern Financial Group at 420, up from 441, with $5 billion, down from $5.4 billion;
• General Cable Corp. at 469, down from 396, with $4.4 billion, down from $6.2 billion;
• American Financial Group at 478, with $4.3 billion in revenues.
AK Steel, which had ranked at 334 in 2009, fell off the list this year.
Job cuts accelerated in March, driven by planned reductions on government payrolls, a report released Thursday showed.
Employers announced plans to cut 67,611 jobs in March, according to outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc. That’s up 61% from February, when 42,090 jobs were lost, the lowest level in nearly four years.
"Unfortunately, many people are still jobless and many businesses still shuttered," said John Challenger, chief executive officer of the firm, in a statement. "This combination is having a significant negative impact on state and local tax revenues and, in turn, leading to continued downsizing in this sector."
Government job cuts led March’s surge, accounting for nearly 75% of the total jobs shed. Year to date, government job losses have made up about a third of all announced cuts.
There were 50,604 announced government job cuts in March, and the United States Postal Service alone plans to reduce its workforce by 30,000 workers this year through retirement and attrition. The rest of the government jobs will be shed by state and local agencies suffering from budget shortfalls.
But overall the trend was still positive. March job cuts were down 55% from the same month a year ago, when 150,411 cuts were announced.
In the first quarter of 2010, a total of 181,183 job cuts were announced, the lowest first quarter total since 2000 and down 69% from the first quarter of 2009.
A separate report Wednesday from payroll processor ADP showed that private-sector employers cut payrolls by 23,000 jobs in March, marking the smallest monthly decline since February 2008. ADP’s report does not include government jobs.
The report sets the stage for the highly anticipated monthly jobs report from the government due Friday. The Labor Department is expected to show a gain of 190,000 jobs in March, compared to the 36,000 lost in February. Economists forecast the unemployment rate will remain unchanged at 9.7%.
Treasurys came off earlier lows and were mostly flat Tuesday afternoon as optimistic investors prepared for monthly jobs data that is expected to show robust growth in the labor market.
What prices are doing: The benchmark 10-year note edged up slightly to 98-1/32, driving the yield down to 3.86% from 3.87% late Monday. Bond prices and yields move in opposite directions.
The 30-year bond rose 25/32 to 98 with a yield of 4.75%. The 5-year note edged up to 99-6/32 with a yield of 2.60%. The 2-year note fell to 99-9/32 with a yield of 1.07%.
What’s moving the market: Treasury prices were lower earlier on hopes of a positive jobs report.
The Labor Department will release the March jobs data Friday. Economists expect employers added 190,000 jobs to payrolls during the month and that the unemployment rate will hold steady at 9.7%.
Treasurys, which are perceived to be safe haven investment, tend to fall on strong economic data.
Meanwhile, the Conference Board reported that the consumer confidence index rebounded in March, after falling sharply during the previous month, which also pressured Treasurys.
What analysts are saying: "Yields are moving higher in anticipation of good employment data," said Peter Cardillo, chief market strategist at Avalon Partners. "If we see job growth above 100,000, and a downtick in total unemployment, that will put pressure on Treasurys and yields will respond to the upside."
He added that the 10-year yield could push beyond 4%, a key psychological level, on Friday’s data.
"Consumer confidence also took a big leap today, and that number is negative for the bond market," Cardillo said.
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