LITTLE ROCK — QUOTE OF THE DAY “It starts and ends with product, that’s what we’ve been focused on since bankruptcy.” Dan Akerson, General Motors Co. chief executive officer Article, 1DFort Smith economic frailty persists
Fort Smith’s regional economy showed continued weakness in November, according to a monthly report from the Center for Business Research and Economic Development at the University of Arkansas at Fort Smith.
The region’s residential-construction permits were positive signs but employment numbers and retails sales were lower, according to a release from the center.
There were 102 residential-construction permits issued in November, an increase of 250 percent compared with the same month in 2011. Year-to-date construction permits were up 2.5 percent compared with the same period in 2011.
November employment showed 1,100 fewer jobs in November compared with 2011, with unemployment at 7.6 percent, down two-tenths of a point when compared with November of the previous year.
Retail sales in October, the most recent data available, were down, dropping year-over-year sales by 1.8 percent.
- John MagsamSEC enforcement chief set to resign
WASHINGTON - Robert Khuzami is leaving the Securities and Exchange Commission after leading the agency’s efforts to penalize the nation’s largest banks for actions that triggered the 2008 financial crisis.
Khuzami was named enforcement director in February 2009, just months after the crisis peaked. In his four years at the helm, he spearheaded investigations that accused banks of misleading investors about risky mortgage securities.
His efforts drew large SEC settlements. Goldman Sachs agreed in July 2010 to pay $550 million to settle civil fraud charges. Similar deals followed with Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase and others.
Critics have said the penalties were a small compared with the banks’ revenue and no senior executives were held accountable.
Khuzami is stepping down within a month of former SEC Chairman Mary Schapiro’s departure from the agency.
- The Associated PressIndia expects 7th record wheat cropNEW DELHI - Wheat output in India, the world’s second-biggest producer, is expected to reach a record for a seventh year as cold weather enhances yield prospects and record domestic prices spur planting, potentially increasing exports. Futures in India fell for a seventh day.
Better soil moisture and below-average temperatures in the main growing states of Punjab and Haryana in the past three weeks have been beneficial for the crop, said Indu Sharma, director at the state-owned Directorate of Wheat Research. The harvest starting from April may climb from an all-time high of 103.5 million tons in 2011-2012, she said.
A bigger harvest may force the government to pare stockpiles through exports and vacate warehouses for the new crop, pressuring futures in Chicago which fell to a six-month low last week. Rising supplies from India may help partly make up for the potential crop losses from the United States, Argentina and Australia because of dry weather.
- Bloomberg NewsRain eases barge fears on Mississippi
Rain will keep water levels high enough to avert a shutdown of barge traffic along a Mississippi River choke point this month before the river begins its seasonal rise in February, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said.
More than an inch of rain is expected in St. Louis today, with further precipitation in four of the next five days.
That should improve a forecast that has the Mississippi near Thebes, Ill., falling to levels where barges would face restrictions by Jan. 22, said Michael Petersen, a Corps spokesman. Contractors are currently removing rock obstacles from the riverbed near Thebes to help keep the channel open.
The Corps also may release water from reservoirs farther north on the Mississippi should rain be less than expected, he said. Still, the situation will need to be monitored as the worst U.S. drought since the 1930s, which created the low water levels, makes historical patterns a less-reliable predictor of future flows, he said.
- Bloomberg NewsBusiness-forecast lunch set in Rogers
Northwest Arkansas’ economy, as well as the rest of the state and the national economy will be the focus of the 19th annual Business Forecast luncheon in February.
The event, featuring a panel of three economics experts, will be 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., Feb. 8, at the John Q.
Hammons Center in Rogers. The luncheon is coordinated by the Center for Business and Economic Research at the Sam M. Walton College of Business at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville.
Adolfo Laurenti, deputy chief economist and managing director of Mesiro Financial, will give the international economic forecast; Christopher Walker, research director and senior vice president at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, will offer perspective on the U.S. economy; and Kathy Deck, director of UA’s Center of Business and Economic Research, will give her forecast for the state and Northwest Arkansas economy.
John Roberts III, president and chief executive of Lowell-based J.B. Hunt Transport Services Inc. will serve as the panel moderator.
More information or reservations are available from (479) 575-415, or by e-mail at [email protected].
- John MagsamFlorida minimum wage rises 12 cents
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - All minimum-wage workers in Florida got a raise Jan. 1 of 12 cents an hour - an extra $4.80 a week for full-time workers.
Florida indexes its minimum wage to inflation, and the adjustment kicks in at the start of each year. The new hourly wage of $7.79 may be a burden for some larger employers, especially those in the retail or hospitality sectors that employ hundreds or thousands of minimum-wage workers.
The statistics show that most minimum-wage workers are teens or young workers in their 20s. Nationally, 5.2 percent of hourly earners are paid minimum wage or less.
Of those, 49.5 percent of workers ages 16 to 24 are paid minimum wage, according to the U.S. Labor Department.
In Florida, 6.3 percent of workers paid hourly receive minimum wage or less.
Florida’s minimum wage is higher than the $7.25 federal figure.
- Cox Newspapers
Business, Pages 24 on 01/10/2013