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“Rising oil prices simply do not have the shock value they once possessed” for U.S. consumers, according to Brian Belski, chief investment strategist at Oppenheimer & Co.

As the CHART OF THE DAY shows, energy accounts for a falling share of household spending, according to data compiled by the Commerce Department. The top panel displays annual rates in billions of dollars, adjusted for inflation.

Gasoline, heating oil and other forms of energy amounted to 3 percent of personal consumption expenditures during last year’s fourth quarter, as the bottom panel indicates. The proportion was 4.3 percent in 1996, when the chart begins.

“We believe consumers have become accustomed to elevated oil prices and have adjusted their spending habits accordingly,” Belski wrote today in a report.

Total outlays increased last quarter to a $9 No teletrack payday loans.43 trillion rate, breaking a record set in the final three months of 2007. The new high occurred even though household spending on energy fell 3 percent from its pace three years earlier.

Even a 20 percent jump in oil prices “should still leave an economic expansion in place,” Bankim Chadha, chief U.S. equity strategist at Deutsche Bank AG, wrote yesterday in a report. Chadha cited energy’s decline as a percentage of consumer expenditures to support his conclusion.

Crude oil climbed 16 percent from Feb. 16, when the commodity’s price began rallying from this year’s low in New York trading, through the end of last week.

(To save a copy of the chart, click here.)

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Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is urging the U.N. Security Council to take “concrete action” to protect civilians in Libya and warning that any delay will mean more loss of life.

Ban urged the council at the start of a meeting to consider possible sanctions against Moammar Gadhafi’s regime to look at a wide range of actions, including trade and financial sanctions, travel bans, an arms embargo, and measures to protect human rights.

He said “the violence must stop” and those responsible for the violence must be punished.

The secretary-general said he plans to travel to Washington on Monday to discuss the Libyan crisis with U.S. President Barack Obama.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP’s earlier story is below.

GENEVA (AP) _ Governments around the world sharply condemned Libya’s crackdown against opposition protesters Friday, calling for a probe into possible crimes against humanity and recommending the country’s suspension from the U.N.’s top human rights body.

The unanimous decision at the end of a daylong emergency meeting of the U.N. Human Rights Council was dramatically preceded by the public defection of all Libyan diplomats in Geneva to the opposition _ swelling the rebellion of Libyan officials around the globe.

Within hours Friday, senior Libyan diplomats in Portugal, France, Sweden and at the U.N.’s cultural and education organization UNESCO announced their rejection of Moammar Gadhafi’s regime.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy, meanwhile, called on Gadhafi to relinquish power after more than four decades.

The U.N.’s High Commissioner for Human Rights warned that the mass killings in Libya, possibly of thousands, required the world to “step in vigorously” and immediately end the government’s brutal suppression of protests in the North African country.

“The crackdown in Libya of peaceful demonstrations is escalating alarmingly with reported mass killings, arbitrary arrests, detention and torture of protesters,” U.N. rights chief Navi Pillay told the 47-nation council. “Tanks, helicopters and military aircraft have reportedly been used indiscriminately to attack the protesters. According to some sources, thousands may have been killed or injured.”

Overcoming initial resistance from some African and Asian countries, the Geneva-based council seized the growing swell of international anger against Gadhafi’s regime to unanimously condemn “the recent gross and systematic human rights violations committed in Libya.”

Council members slammed Libya for its “indiscriminate armed attacks against civilians, extrajudicial killings, arbitrary arrests, detention and torture of peaceful demonstrators, some of which may also amount to crimes against humanity.”

In an unprecedented move against one of its own members, they also called for Libya’s ouster from the council. That decision has to be approved by a two-thirds majority in the 192-nation U.N. General Assembly, which is expected to meet on the matter next week.

But the most unexpected moment of the day came when a senior diplomat with the Libyan delegation to the U.N. in Geneva took the floor, asking for a moment of silence to “honor this revolution” _ and then informed the council that his entire diplomatic mission was quitting the government. Council members gave them a standing ovation.

“The young people in my country today, 100 years after the Italian fascist invasion, are today with their blood writing a new chapter in the history of struggle and resistance,” Adel Shaltut told the chamber.

“We in the Libyan mission have categorically decided to serve as representatives of the Libyan people and their free will. We only represent the Libyan people,” he said.

Gadhafi, who has ruled Libya for 42 years, now appears to have lost control of large parts of the country, as well as any previous support he might have had in the international community.

Sarkozy urged him to step down, demanding during a visit to Turkey that Gadhafi “must go,” and calling for an investigation into the violence and sanctions against the regime.

British Prime Minister David Cameron told reporters the world would hold Gadhafi and his supporters to account for the bloodshed. “International justice has a long reach and a long memory,” he said.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev issued the Kremlin’s strongest criticism yet of Libya, saying Libya must not be allowed any “further exacerbation of the situation, the destruction of the civilian population.”

The U.N. Security Council also planned to meet later Friday in New York to consider actions against Libya.

In Brussels, NATO held an emergency meeting Friday on the deteriorating situation in Libya but took no action. Its chief said it had no plans to intervene.

In Geneva, even those countries traditionally hostile toward criticism of human rights abuses dropped all pretense at supporting Gadhafi and swung their moral weight behind the protesters.

Pakistan’s ambassador, Zamir Akram, speaking for the 57 members of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, said “Muslims will no longer tolerate inequalities and injustice.”

“A new dawn has come,” he told the council. “The rules of the game have changed. Those who do not embrace it will be swept away.”

____

Associated Press reporters across Europe contributed to this report.

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QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“So the battle going on in Wisconsin is part of a larger war. It is about Republicans across the country trying to use voter anger at the economy to institute out-of-the-mainstream, far-right policies by pretending they are related to jobs or deficits (like the insane argument that tax cuts for the wealthiest one percent of Americans will somehow translate to significant job growth) free credit report and score.”

Lowe’s Cos.’ fourth-quarter profit rose 39 percent as home owners took on more renovation projects as the economy slowly recovers.

The results announced Wednesday beat Wall Street estimates, but Lowe’s first-quarter earnings forecast suggested its results could come in below current forecasts.

The weak outlook stood in contrast to competitor Home Depot’s increased earnings outlook issued a day earlier. Lowe’s shares slipped 38 cents to $25.61 in premarket trading.

Still, home-improvement retailers are seeing signs of life from shoppers as they take on projects around the house that were delayed during the consumer spending slowdown and recession.

“While uncertainty in the market remains, the economic recovery is continuing,” said CEO Robert Niblock.

The No. 2 home-improvement retailer said its net income rose to $285 million, or 21 cents per share, for the three months ended Jan. 28 from $205 million, or 14 cents per share, a year ago. Analysts surveyed by FactSet expected 18 cents per share.

The Mooresville, N.C., company said revenue rose 3 percent to $10.48 billion from $10.17 billion. Analysts expected $10.44 billion.

“While the housing market remains uncertain, we believe Lowe’s will continue to gain market share and benefit from a more stabilized environment,” said Bank of America Merrill Lynch analyst Alan Rifkin, who kept his “Buy” rating on the stock. “Further, we favor Lowe’s increased focus on shareholder returns and believe buybacks and dividends will continue to drive returns.”

For the year, Lowe’s net income rose 13 percent to $2.01 billion, or $1.42 per share, from $1.78 billion, or $1.21 per share a year ago.

Annual revenue rose 3 percent to $48.82 billion from $47.22 billion.

Lowe’s expects first-quarter net income of 34 cents to 38 cents per share while analysts expect net income of 38 cents per share. The company predicts revenue will rise 2 percent and revenue in stores open at least a year will be flat.

For the year, the company expects net income of $1.60 to $1.72 per share on a 5 percent revenue increase. Revenue in stores open at least a year is expected to rise 5 percent. Analysts expected earnings of $1.66 per share.

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It pays to be rich if you need a credit card.

A year after sweeping credit card regulations upended the industry, banks are showering perks and rewards on big spenders with sterling credit scores. And they’re socking customers with spottier histories with higher interest rates, lower credit limits and new annual fees. In some cases the riskiest customers are being dropped altogether.

“When you look at the regulations, it’s a net positive for consumers,” says Peter Garuccio, a spokesman for the American Bankers Association. “But there have been some trade-offs.”

The widening differences between how customers are treated is largely the result of new constraints on card issuers. The Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility and Disclosure Act, or the CARD Act, was signed into law with great fanfare at a time when borrowers across the country were struggling to make payments. It swept away several practices that for years had grated on cardholders.

The regulations are already transforming the cards on the market. To make up for the drop in revenue, banks are imposing new annual fees and hiking interest rates

Treasuries rose, with two-year notes climbing the most since September, as concern of spreading unrest in the Middle East boosted demand for the relative safety of U.S. government debt.

Ten-year note yields fell as Egypt approved a request from Iran to send two naval ships through the Suez Canal on their way to Syria, which ratcheted up regional tensions and drove oil prices higher as Israel called it a “provocation.” The Federal Reserve purchased $24 billion of Treasuries and TIPS during the week, as part of its efforts to sustain the economic expansion. The Treasury will sell $99 billion of notes next week.

“Geopolitical risk remains and there is a lot of uncertainty about the possibility of it spreading, which has given Treasuries a bid,” said Suvrat Prakash, an interest-rate strategist in New York at BNP Paribas, one of the 20 primary dealers required to bid at Treasury auctions. “With Fed purchases continuing and global unrest, Treasuries have support.”

Two-year note yields fell nine basis points to 0.75 percent in New York, according to BGCantor Data, the most since the week ending on Sept. 17, from 0.84 percent on Feb. 11. The price of the 0.625 percent securities maturing in January 2013 was 99 24/32. Ten-year note yields dropped five basis points to 3.58 percent from 3.63 percent.

Flight to Bills

Three-month bill rates traded as low as 0.0821 percent yesterday, the least since June 17. One-month bill rates were little changed at 0.0659 percent.

“Anytime there is civil unrest anywhere people will flock to Treasury bills,” said Michael Franzese, head of Treasury trading at Wunderlich Securities Inc. in New York. “Investors feel they can wait out in bills the uncertainty with regard to what is going on with Federal Reserve monetary policy and the direction of long-term Treasury yields.”

Treasuries pared a weekly gain yesterday after a European Central Bank official said it may need to raise interest rates as global inflation pressures mount while the Fed maintains its target of almost-zero short-term rates. ECB Executive Board member Lorenzo Bini Smaghi said the “degree of accommodation of monetary policy has to be monitored and, if needed, corrected,” in an interview with the daily newsletter Bloomberg Brief: Economics.

Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke’s speech text in Paris yesterday didn’t address the U.S. monetary policy that central bank policy makers maintained last month along with plans to buy $600 billion of Treasuries through June. Paris is hosting the Group of 20 meetings of central bankers and finance ministers this weekend.

Fed Views

Minutes of the Fed’s meeting last month showed policy makers regarded the U.S. recovery as being on a “firmer footing.” The central bank raised projections for economic growth this year and made little change to forecasts after 2011 or for unemployment and inflation payday loan. They were divided about whether further evidence of a strengthening recovery would warrant slowing or reducing the Treasuries buying.

“People were expecting the minutes to mention some sort of exit plan, but the Fed signaled that they are more concerned about growth, which lets the market know that they are inclined to stay accommodative,” BNP Paribas’s Prakash said.

The difference between yields on two-year notes and Treasury Inflation Protected Securities, which tracks the outlook for consumer prices during the life of the debt, expanded to 2.04 percentage points, the widest gap since July 2008.

Economic Reading

Government economic reports showed housing starts climbed 15 percent in January to a 596,000 annual rate and the consumer price index increased 0.4 percent in January, exceeding the 0.3 percent median estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News, figures from the Labor Department showed. Year-on-year inflation accelerated to 1.6 percent, the highest since May.

“The fundamentals look good, and are bearish for Treasuries, but the market can’t ignore geopolitical risk like this,” said James Caron, head of U.S. interest-rate strategy at Morgan Stanley in New York, a primary dealer.

President Barack Obama sent Congress a $3.7 trillion budget that projects the federal deficit will exceed $1 trillion for the fourth consecutive year in 2012 before falling to more “sustainable” levels by the middle of the decade.

Deficit Politics

The deficit for the current fiscal year is forecast to hit a record $1.6 trillion — 10.9 percent of gross domestic product — up from the $1.4 trillion the administration estimated previously. It would be $1.1 trillion in 2012, 7 percent of GDP. By 2015 it would decline to $607 billion, or 3.2 percent of GDP.

The U.S. plans to sell $35 billion in two-year notes on Feb. 22, the same amount of five-year debt the following day and $29 billion in seven-year securities on Feb. 24.

Treasuries have handed investors a 1 percent loss in 2011, while inflation-linked Treasuries decreased 0.8 percent, according to indexes compiled by Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

“No one wants to be short going into a long weekend that could expose the market to a lot of event risk,” said Thomas Tucci, managing director and head of rates trading at Royal Bank of Canada in New York. “Any selloff will be limited given the potential for more geopolitical headlines.”

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Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke on Friday urged countries with large trade surpluses like China to let their currencies rise in value to help prevent another global financial crisis.

He also called on nations with persistent trade deficits like the United States to narrow their budget shortfalls and save more.

Both steps would help balance trade and investment flows among countries, Bernanke said in prepared remarks to a financial conference in Paris. Many countries worry about speculative money flooding their economies and inflating assets like real estate or stocks.

Builders began work on more homes than forecast in January, reflecting a surge in multifamily units.

Housing starts climbed 15 percent to a 596,000 annual rate, Commerce Department figures showed today in Washington. The median forecast in a Bloomberg News survey called for a 539,000 rate. Work started on 78 percent more dwellings with two or more units, overshadowing a drop in single-family houses that indicates the housing market continues to struggle.

As unemployment hovers around 9 percent and lenders continue to foreclose on delinquent owners, homebuilders must compete with a surfeit of unsold properties. Companies like Hovnanian Enterprises Inc. anticipate falling prices and low borrowing costs will lift homebuyer traffic later this year.

“Housing activity is going to remain at depressed levels this year,” said Ellen Zentner, a senior macro economist at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd. in New York who forecast a rate of 555,000. “We’ve got home prices that have taken another leg down and will probably stay down through midyear.”

Wholesale costs in the U.S. increased for a seventh consecutive month in January, led by higher prices for fuel, a report from the Labor Department also showed today. The producer price index rose 0.8 percent. The so-called core measure, which excludes volatile food and energy costs, rose 0.5 percent, the biggest rise since October 2008.

Shares Rise

Stock-index futures held earlier gains following the reports and Treasury securities were little changed. The contract on the Standard & Poor’s Index maturing in March rose 0.4 percent to 1,331.1 at 8:47 a.m. in New York. The yield on the benchmark 10- year note was 3.61 percent, the same as late yesterday.

Estimates of 76 economists in the Bloomberg News survey ranged from 475,000 to 590,000. December’s pace was revised to 520,000 from a previous estimate of 529,000.

Building permits, an indicator for future construction, dropped 10 percent to a 562,000 annual pace in January. Permits had climbed 15 percent in December after builders rushed to complete applications before new building codes went into effect this year.

Single-Family Drops

Construction of single-family houses decreased 1 percent to a 413,000 rate in January from the prior month, the fewest since May 2009. Work on multifamily homes, such as townhouses and apartments, jumped to a 183,000 pace, the most since February 2009, from 103,000 rate in December.

Starts rose in three of four regions last month, led by a 42 percent jump in the Northeast. Work began on 9.7 percent fewer houses in the West.

While other parts of the economy have rebounded from the recession, the housing market must improve “to ensure a complete, stable, and sustainable recovery,” according to Federal Reserve Governor Sarah Bloom Raskin, who last week urged mortgage companies and investors to help revive housing bad credit payday advance.

“The government can only do so much, and relevant private sector actors need to think beyond their bottom line and focus on how their firms’ actions are or are not contributing to the economic recovery,” Raskin said Feb. 11 at a mortgage conference in Park City, Utah.

Fed Policy Maker

Housing prices may face “more downward pressure” because of “a pipeline full of distressed properties,” she said, noting too that “the persistent high rate of unemployment is further depressing housing demand, creating uncertainty about housing prices, and impeding that robust recovery in the housing sector that we generally see.”

With high joblessness and bank seizures poised to resume after a slowdown, foreclosure filings will climb about 20 percent in 2011, reaching a peak for the housing crisis, RealtyTrac Inc. said last month. Those foreclosures may further discourage construction and hurt home values.

Developers’ confidence stagnated in February, reflecting competition from foreclosed properties and a lack of credit. The National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo sentiment index held at 16, the same as the past four months, figures showed yesterday. Readings less than 50 mean more respondents said conditions were poor.

Prices Fall

There were 190,000 new houses on the market at the end of December, the fewest since January 1968, the Commerce Department said Jan. 26. Home values in the U.S. fell during the fourth quarter because potential buyers anticipated prices would decline further. The median price of a single-family home dropped from a year earlier in 71 of 152 metropolitan areas tracked by the National Association of Realtors, the group said last week.

“Affordability is the least of the problems right now,” Ara Hovnanian, chief executive officer of New Jersey’s largest homebuilder, said this week on Bloomberg Television’s “Surveillance Midday” with Tom Keene. “The issue is unemployment, fear and lack of confidence, and that’s what’s got to turn right now.”

Hovnanian Enterprises Inc. on Dec. 22 reported a fourth- quarter loss bigger than analysts expected as revenue fell 19 percent. The company has cut about 75 percent of its workforce in the past four years, Hovnanian said during the interview. He said he expects the industry “to start building some momentum” in the second quarter.

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Sales at U.S. retailers rose less than forecast in January, depressed by a drop in demand at building material stores and restaurants that may reflect the influence of harsh winter weather.

Purchases increased 0.3 percent, the smallest gain since a drop in June and followed a 0.5 percent December gain that was less than previously estimated, Commerce Department figures showed today in Washington. The median forecast of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News called for a 0.5 percent rise.

Sales at retailers like Gap Inc., Limited Brands Inc. and Macy’s Inc. topped analysts’ estimates last month as merchants used promotions to lure post-holiday shoppers before storms blanketed much of the U.S. mid month. Federal Reserve policy makers are among those saying bigger gains in employment are needed to ensure American consumers sustain spending.

Whole Foods Market Inc., the largest U.S. natural-goods grocer, last week raised its annual profit and revenue forecasts after the Austin, Texas-based company’s first-quarter earnings beat analysts’ estimates.

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China says it will conduct national-security reviews of foreign attempts to buy local companies in fields including farming and transportation in a move that might fuel complaints it is blocking access to its markets.

China received $105.7 billion in foreign direct investment last year but business groups complain Beijing is trying to nurture Chinese companies by using regulation to hamper foreign rivals in violation of its free-trade pledges.

The government will review proposed acquisitions in fields including energy, farming, transportation, heavy equipment manufacturing and “key technologies,” the Cabinet said in a weekend announcement. Reviews will apply to an offer to acquire at least 50 percent of a Chinese company.

The measure appears to go beyond a traditional national security review and involves looking at factors such as the impact on the economy and social stability, according to James Zimmerman, a lawyer in Beijing for the firm Squire Sanders & Dempsey LLP.

“Such a review adds a layer of bureaucratic intermeddling into commercial and economic terms that have no real impact on China’s defense policies,” Zimmerman said in an e-mail. He said regulators will have “discretion to quash legitimate foreign investment transactions for protectionist reasons.”

Beijing has complained that national security objections in the United States and other countries have blocked Chinese acquisitions.

A U.S. panel is reviewing the purchase by a Chinese company, Huawei Technologies Ltd guaranteed high risk personal loans., of American computer firm 3Leaf Systems Inc. U.S. critics say the deal might lead to the transfer of sensitive technology to China.

In 2005, a state-owned Chinese oil company, CNOOC Ltd., dropped an $18.5 billion bid to acquire Los Angeles-based oil and gas producer Unocal Corp. after critics complained the deal might endanger national security.

Beijing welcomes foreign investment but some Chinese officials have said it wants foreigners to set up new companies rather than acquiring existing assets.

The review panel is being created under a Chinese anti-monopoly law enacted in 2008.

Beijing has cited national security or anti-monopoly concerns in blocking major foreign acquisitions in cases that prompted warnings about protectionist sentiment.

A 2005 bid by U.S. private equity firm Carlyle Group to buy a stake in a manufacturer of construction equipment, Xugong Group, triggered a nationalist outcry against the sale of Chinese assets to foreigners. Beijing responded by declaring the field a strategic industry that required national security review and Carlyle later dropped its bid.

In 2009, anti-monopoly regulators rejected Coca-Cola Co.’s $2.5 billion bid to acquire a leading Chinese fruit juice producer, Huiyuan Juice Group Ltd.

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