LITTLE ROCK — QUOTE OF THE DAY
“Holiday 2009 can be described in one word,‘ adequate.’”
Marshal Cohen,
chief retail industry analyst
at Port Washington, N.Y.-based NPD Group Inc.
Article, 1DT-bill rates climb to 3-month high
WASHINGTON - Interest rates on short-term Treasury bills rose in Monday’s auction to the highest levels since September.
The Treasury Department auctioned $28 billion in three-month bills at a discount rate of 0.110 percent, up from 0.070 percent over the past week. An additional $29 billion in six-month bills was auctioned at a discount rate of 0.200 percent, up from 0.170 percent last week.
The three-month rate was the highest since three month bills averaged 0.115 percent on Sept. 28. The six month rate was the highest since 0.210 percent auctioned on Sept. 14.
Even with the small increases Monday, three- and six month bills remain near historic lows. They have been there for much of the past year, reflecting the Federal Reserve’s efforts to keep interest rates low to strengthen the struggling economy.
The discount rates reflect that the Treasury bills sell for less than face value. For a $10,000 bill, the three month price was $9,997.22 while a six-month bill sold for $9,989.89. That would equal an annualized rate of 0.112 percent for the three-month bills and 0.203 percent for the six-month bills.
China Mobile exec under scrutiny
BEIJING - China Mobile Ltd., the world’s biggest phone company by subscribers, said Monday that its deputy chairman is under investigation for unspecified offenses, adding to a string of scandals at major Chinese state-owned companies.
Zhang Chunjiang is being investigated “due to suspected serious personal violations,” the company said in a statement issued through the Hong Kong stock exchange, where its shares are traded.
It said he was being investigated by “relevant authorities” but gave no other details. China Mobile’s news office did not immediately respond to requests by phone and email for more information.
A series of executives at major state-owned companies have been targeted for investigation of corruption and other offenses that are fueling public anger. Thousands of government and Communist Party figures are punished every year for corruption, and some are executed.
Russia opens Far East oil terminal
MOSCOW - Russia opened a new oil export terminal Monday to serve as a gateway for energy exports to Asia.
With the click of a computer mouse, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin began the filling of a Hong Kong-bound tanker at the terminal in the Far Eastern port of Kozmino.
Putin said the $2 billion Kozmino terminal would enable Russia “to enter the growing markets of the Asia-Pacific region.”
Kozmino is the destination for a new crude pipeline from eastern Siberia’s oil fields. The first 1,700-mile section of the pipeline was completed last month between Taishet, in eastern Siberia, and Skovorodino, near the Chinese border. But exports to energy-hungry China are expected to start only in 2011, after the countries’ pipeline systems are linked.
A second 1,300-mile section of the pipeline between Skovorodino and Kozmino is expected to be completed by 2012. Until then, oil is being carried by rail.
AT&T resumes online iPhone sales
NEW YORK - AT&T Inc. suspended online sales of iPhones to New Yorkers over the weekend for unknown reasons, then abruptly started selling them again just as mysteriously on Monday.
Spokesman Fletcher Cook said only that the phone company periodically “modifies” its distribution channels. He had no further comment on the resumption in sales, and officials with phone maker Apple Inc. did not immediately return messages for comment.
Bloggers speculated that the sales suspension was a means of managing data traffic, since AT&T has acknowledged that its network is overburdened with iPhone users in New York and San Francisco.
Because the phones remained available in New York retail stores and from Apple Inc.’s Web site, the ban may have instead been an attempt to curb buyers who renege on the service contracts and resell the phones to customers of other carriers overseas.
On AT&T’s Web site, buyers who supplied New York City ZIP codes were told on Monday morning to “Please shop for another phone.” By afternoon, though, the Web site raised no obstacles when the same ZIP codes were supplied.
Study: Ponzi-scam failures rise in ’09
MIAMI - It was a rough year for Ponzi schemes. An Associated Press analysis of all 50 states shows that the recession caused nearly four times as many Ponzi scheme collapses in 2009 as there were in 2008.
Tens of thousands of investors watched more than $16.5 billion disappear. That included the life savings of many people.
Investors lost more money to such scams in 2008 because of the failure of Bernie Madoff’s long-running scheme estimated at $21 billion to $50 billion.
But experts say the main reason so many more Ponzi plots collapsed this year was that investors had less money to risk. The Madoff case also made investors more careful and brought tighter regulation from federal authorities.
More than 150 Ponzi schemes collapsed in 2009 compared with about 40 in 2008.
Ford reviving V-8 in ’10 Mustang
Ford Motor Co. is reviving a bigger, more powerful V-8 engine for its Mustang as the muscle car tries to fend off a sales challenge from General Motors Co.’s Chevrolet Camaro.
A Mustang version with the 5-liter V-8 will be available in 2010’s second quarter, according to the Dearborn, Mich.-based automaker. That engine size had been retired in 1995 after three decades of use in the car, Ford said in a statement Monday.
Ford, in a rivalry that dates to the late 1960s, is adding an engine with 412 horsepower, 31 percent more than the current 4.6-liter Mustang V-8. The Camaro, with a 426-horsepower V-8, debuted in April and has outsold the Ford model each month since June. GM said that’s given it a chance to wrest away the U.S. sports-car annual sales crown for the first time since 1986.
Business, Pages 26 on 12/29/2009