NEWS IN BRIEF

Thursday, December 27, 2012

— More Murphy stations to go up at Wal-Marts

Murphy Oil USA Inc.

will build more than 200 fuel stations at existing Wal-Mart Stores Inc. supercenters, Murphy Oil Corp., the owner of Murphy Oil USA, said Wednesday.

“This agreement represents a significant step forward in our long-term relationship with Wal-Mart as we pursue our business plan to separate the U.S.

retail business into a standalone entity,” Steve Cosse, president and chief executive officer of El Doradobased Murphy Oil, said in a prepared statement.

The parent company announced in October that it would spin off its retail gasoline business during 2013.

The move will separate its retail and marketing business from its exploration and production operations.

Murphy Oil said the agreement will allow the company access to markets in the Midwest and Southeast, according to the news release.

Construction on the fuel stations is expected to be finished in three years.

A spokesman for the company could not be reached for additional comment.

ABF offers details

on union proposal

FORT SMITH - ABF Freight System Inc. filed a statement Wednesday that supplies more information about the Fort Smith trucking company’s contract proposals with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.

ABF has proposed “a single comprehensive national contract that would eliminate separate supplemental documents,” according to the statement filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

The separate regional supplemental documents govern time off, scheduling and other work rules by region or state and are applied in addition to national contract provisions.

Companies like ABF need “uniformity in timeoff benefits, scheduling, dispatching and other work rules to ensure that regional and national networks can meet customers’ demands for flexible on-time performance at a reasonable price,” the company said in an earlier statement.

ABF’s approximately 7,500 Teamster employees are now governed by the National Master Freight Agreement, as well as 15 additional supplemental contracts for certain regions.

The labor contract talks are expected to resume the week of Jan. 7. The current contract expires at midnight March 31.

Arkansas Index dip

The Arkansas Index, a price-weighted index that tracks the largest public companies based in the state, fell 1.9 to finish Wednesday at 246.06.

Index volume was 7.9 million shares; the average is 28.5 million.

The index was developed by Bloomberg News and the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette with a base value of 100 as of Dec. 30, 1997.

Business, Pages 21 on 12/27/2012