Financial Freedom. Best business news.

Australia unexpectedly lost jobs for a second straight month in December, capping the nation

Ralcorp board OKs spinoff — Ralcorp Holdings Inc.’s board has approved the spinoff of its Post cereals business, the food maker said Tuesday, and the stock distribution is set to happen Feb. 3. The St. Louis company said it will complete the separation of the two businesses by giving at least 80 percent of Post Holdings Inc.’s outstanding stock to Ralcorp shareholders of record as of Jan. 30. Each stockholder will get one share of Post for every two shares of Ralcorp held on the record date. Ralcorp will maintain a stake in Post. Ralcorp’s stock will continue to trade on the New York Stock Exchange under the “RAH” ticker symbol. Post is expected to start trading on the NYSE under the “POST” ticker symbol Feb. 3.

Will new car sales rise? — That clunker in America’s driveway has reached a record old age, but there are signs that people may be growing confident enough in the economy to get a whiff of that fresh new car scent very soon. The average age of a car or truck in the U.S. hit a record 10.8 years last year as job security and other economic worries kept many people from making big-ticket purchases. That’s up from the old record of 10.6 years in 2010, and it and continues a trend that dates to 1995, when the average age of a car was 8.4 years, according to a study of state vehicle registration data by the Southfield, Mich.-based Polk automotive research firm. However, Polk Vice President Mark Seng says that a rebound in sales last year and expected growth for the next couple of years is likely to slow the growth rate in the age of cars as a whole in America.

Airbus touts record in orders — Airbus took in a record number of orders for new commercial aircraft last year as strong demand for its revamped single-aisle plane helped it best U.S. rival Boeing Co. in the race for orders for the fourth year running. The European jet maker said Tuesday that it took in 1,419 net new orders in 2011, worth $140 billion, well above Boeing’s total of 805 aircraft. That topped the previous record of 1,413 net orders recorded by Boeing in 2007. Airbus also delivered 534 aircraft last year, up from 510 a year earlier and keeping the title of world’s biggest jet maker that it has held since 2003. Boeing delivered 477 aircraft last year.

Yahoo co-founder leaves firm — Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang is leaving the struggling company’s board. The departure, announced Tuesday, comes just two weeks after Yahoo Inc. hired former PayPal executive Scott Thompson as its CEO. Yang expressed his support of Thompson in his resignation. He had been on Yahoo’s board of directors since the company’s 1995 inception. Yang also is stepping down from the boards of China’s Alibaba Group and Yahoo Japan. Yahoo is negotiating to sell its stakes in both companies.

earnings

Citigroup’s loan portfolio improved late last year, partly because Americans were better about paying down credit card debt. But choppy financial markets hurt its investment banking profits, and the bank missed expectations. Profit fell 11 percent in the last three months of last year. to $1.16 billion, or 38 cents per share, on revenue of $17.2 billion. A year earlier, Citigroup made $1.3 billion on revenue of $18.4 billion.

Lee Enterprises, owner of the Post-Dispatch and other newspapers, reported a profit of $14.6 million, or 32 cents per share, for the quarter that ended Dec. 25. That compares to $19 million, or 42 cents per share, in the same quarter of 2010. Lee, based in Davenport, Iowa, said the year-over-year comparison would be positive if not for refinancing costs and other unusual items. Excluding such matters, profits would equal 38 cents per share for the recent quarter, compared with 32 cents a year earlier. Operating revenue was down 3.9 percent in the quarter compared with a year earlier. As in earlier periods, Lee showed sharp gains in digital advertising while print ads, which make up the bulk of its advertising, continued to decline. Combined print and digital advertising was down 6.1 percent. Lee filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last month, submitting a reorganization plan pre-approved by the vast majority of its creditors. Chief Financial Officer Carl Schmidt said Tuesday that the court will be asked to set Jan. 30 as the date to make the plan effective, allowing the company to exit bankruptcy. (Staff reports)

Pulaski Financial Corp., owner of Pulaski Bank, reported a slight decline in profit in the first fiscal quarter, compared with a year earlier. The bank earned of $2.525 million, or 23 cents per share, compared with $2.601 million, or 24 cents, a year earlier. CEO Gary Douglass said he expects “meaningful, year-over-year earnings improvement” for this year. (Jim Gallagher)

TD Ameritrade said its fiscal first-quarter net income grew 5 percent, though its revenue was almost unchanged. The online brokerage posted $152 million in net income, or about 27 cents per share, up from $145 million, or 25 cents, a year earlier. Revenue fell less than 1 percent to $653.4 million.

A steadier mortgage business, higher commercial lending and an increase in deposits lifted Wells Fargo & Co.’s fourth-quarter profit by 20 percent. The bank reported that the amount of mortgages it wrote in the last three months of last year jumped 35 percent compared with the third quarter, to $120 billion. Overall loan balances rose to $769.6 billion, up 2 percent from a year earlier. The bank, the largest consumer lender in the U.S., reported a 2 percent increase in commercial loans, to $5.6 billion, reflecting direct lending and the purchase of portfolios from other lenders. The bank’s brokerage division, Wells Fargo Advisors, is based in St. Louis.

— Find full versions of these stories at stltoday.com/business

Source

Things are looking up in Europe, at least for now, as borrowing costs in Italy and Spain eased Thursday following strong debt auctions.

Spain’s auction of nearly €10 billion worth of bonds in three different maturities met with strong demand, as did Italy’s €8.5 billion of 12-month bills.

The European Central Bank was "supplying quite a bit of liquidity" by buying an undisclosed amount of bonds to prop up the market, as it typically does, said Frances Hudson, global thematic strategist for Standard Life Investments in Edinburgh, Scotland.

But the auctions were also driven by newfound confidence in the new leadership of the Spanish and Italian governments, she added. "You go into a halo effect because you’ve got a new government so people are willing to give them the benefit of the doubt."

German and Italy sound upbeat on debt crisis

David Rodriguez, quantitative strategist at DailyFX, noted that Spain wound up selling nearly twice the amount it had planned on auctioning, which signals real market demand for bonds, not just support from the ECB.

"Maybe the ECB stepped in, but the ECB wouldn’t have the firepower to put €5 billion into that auction," he said. "I think what investors are seeing is the probability that these nations will remain solvent for the foreseeable future."

The healthy demand for Italian and Spanish bonds helped to drive up European stocks. London’s FTSE () closed higher by 1.2%, the DAX () in Frankfurt rose 2 no teletrack payday loan.5% and the CAC 40 () in Paris jumped 2.3%.

The auction results also helped to drive down bond yields. The average yield for the Italian 10-year bond slipped to 6.63%, remaining below the anxiety benchmark of 7%, and the average yield for the 10-year Spanish bond dropped to 5.13%.

But Hudson cautioned against extrapolating too much from the Italian bond auction and its impact on the 10-year bond yields, since it was for bills, not bonds. Also, she said she wasn’t sure how long the renewed confidence would last.

Don’t get too comfortable with European bonds, urged Marc Chandler, strategist at Brown Brothers Harriman, noting that more auctions lie ahead.

The euro’s fatal problem isnt’ spending

"Risk lies with the bond sale tomorrow, especially with the large increase in Italian bond prices today as the 5-year yield is off 60 [basis points] and the 10-year yield has dropped about 40 [basis points]," wrote Chandler, in a market report. "The year is long, and the amount that the sovereigns and banks need to raise is large."

The euro also got a modest boost Thursday, edging to $1.28 against the U.S. dollar, after hitting an 18-month low of $1.26 on Wednesday.

"At least on the short end of the curve, you see a little bit of confidence returning to the market," said Rodriguez, referring to the euro and European bonds. 

Source

St. Louis Place, a 20-story office building in downtown St. Louis, is facing foreclosure after its owner apparently was unable to renegotiate its real estate loan with U.S. Bank.

The building, at 200 North Broadway, is nearly 90 percent full. The primary occupant is the headquarters of Fleishman-Hillard, the public relations firm with offices worldwide.

A foreclosure sale is scheduled for Jan. 27.

Records show that Behringer Harvard, a Dallas-based real estate investment trust, and affiliates paid Trizec Properties $30.15 million for St. Louis Place in 2004. The red brick building, designed by the Peckman Guyton Albers & Viets architecture firm and completed in 1983, is distinctive for balconies set beneath a large overhang spanning the middle floors.

A Behringer Harvard official was unavailable for comment Monday. A lawyer for U.S. Bank declined to comment.

In a report to the Securities and Exchange Commission in November, Behringer Harvard said its St. Louis Place property manager and asset manager was in talks with the lender to restructure the loan No teletrack payday loans. The report said there was “no assurance that this loan will be restructured,” adding that foreclosure or surrendering the building to the lender was possible.

Also in November, U.S. Bank went to court to get a receiver appointed to take over the building’s operation.

On Thursday, St. Louis Circuit Judge Mark Neill appointed Cassidy Turley, a commercial real estate firm, to manage St. Louis Place.

Lingering weakness in the downtown property market has put pressure on building owners to maintain occupancy and lease rates while trying to pay off large real estate loans.

At least one big downtown company has decided to stay put and buy its leased space instead of building a new headquarters. In August, Stifel Finacial Corp. said it would buy its headquarters at 501 North Broadway instead of investing in a new headquarters at Ballpark Village.

Source

Regions Financial is days away from announcing a sale of its Morgan Keegan unit, according to a Wall Street Journal report. And it seems St. Louis-based Stifel Financial may not be out of the bidding.

The news follows a more than six-month-long effort by Birmingham-based Regions to sell Morgan Keegan, a Memphis based brokerage with 1,200 financial advisers nationwide.

Citing anonymous sources, Bloomberg News said last week that Regions had ended the talks with Stifel.

However, the Wall Street Journal also is reporting online today that Stifel remains in the hunt to buy Morgan Keegan and is bidding against Raymond James, a St. Petersburg-based brokerage with 5,400 financial advisers. Stifel has about 2,000 financial advisers.

The Wall Street Journal’s report says the sale price for Morgan Keegan will range between $900 million and $1 billion, which is less than what Regions sought for the unit when it placed it up for sale last June Payday advance. Regions bought Morgan Keegan in 2001 for $789 million.

Regions owes the U.S. Treasury $3.5 billion from participating in the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP, in 2008, and is seeking to use the proceeds from the Morgan Keegan sale to pay a portion of the TARP money it owes.

A Regions spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the status of the Morgan Keegan sale.

Source

A wave of explosions struck two Shiite neighborhoods in Baghdad on Thursday, killing at least 23 people and intensifying fears that insurgents are stepping up attacks after the U.S. troop withdrawal that was completed last month.

The attacks began with the explosion of a bomb attached to a motorcycle near a bus stop where day laborers gather to look for work in the Sadr city neighborhood. The blast killed eight people, police said.

One of those who witnessed the attack said it filled the area with thick black smoke.

“People have real fears that the cycle of violence might be revived in this country,” said Tariq Annad, a 52-year-old government employee who lives nearby.

That attack was followed by the explosion of a roadside bomb nearby that killed another person. Police found a third bomb nearby and defused it.

Less than two hours later, two blasts struck the Shiite neighborhood of Kazimiyah in the north of the capital, killing 14 people.

Officials said the Kazimiyah blasts occurred almost simultaneously, with at least one caused by a car bomb.

Hospital officials confirmed the causalities, which included at least 60 wounded.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release the information.

Iraqi leaders have warned of a resurgence of Sunni and Shiite militants and an increase in violence following the departure of U no credit check payday loans.S. troops.

The early morning blasts followed deadly attacks Wednesday that targeted the homes of police officers and a member of a government-allied militia. Those attacks, in the cities of Baqouba and Abu Ghraib outside Baghdad, killed four people, including two children, officials said.

The latest violence comes as Iraqi politicians remain deadlocked in a festering political crisis that threatens to re-ignite simmering sectarian tensions in the country.

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s government, dominated by Iraq’s majority Shiites, issued an arrest warrant for the country’s top Sunni politician last month. The Sunni official, Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi, is currently holed up in Iraq’s Kurdish north _ effectively out of reach of state security forces.

Al-Maliki’s main political rival, the Sunni-backed Iraqiya bloc, is boycotting parliament sessions and Cabinet meetings to protest what they say are efforts by the government to consolidate power and marginalize them.

Source

Manufacturing in India and China improved in December, a sign the world

Stocks closed down more than 1% Wednesday, as investors continued to fret over how Europe could solve its debt troubles in 2012. Selling intensified ahead of the close.

On a light trading week, investors have few other economic or corporate indicators to mull before 2011 ends.

Still, traders and analysts said the low volumes led to more pronounced swings, and some of the moves are coming from year-end portfolio rebalancing rather than convictions over the trajectory of all stocks or a particular stock.

"I don’t know what to read into today," said Peter Boockvar, equity strategist at Miller Tabak + Co. "There’s nothing going on in the U.S. market. It’s a holiday week."

The S&P fell back into negative territory for the year.

The Dow Jones industrial average () closed down 140 points, or 1.1%. The S&P 500 () slid 16 points, or 1.3%. The Nasdaq () lost 35 points, or 1.3% .

Dragging down the technology sector Wednesday were RIMM, () Netflix () and Fossil (). The Nasdaq is down roughly 2% for 2011.

Despite Wednesday’s sell-off, the Dow remains up 5% for 2011.

Some traders still hope to close the year poised for a January bounce. To get there, some say 1260 would be the magic number for the S&P to clear on Friday.

"If we could clear 1,260 by the end of the week, we could see a strong rally in January," said Joe Bell, senior equity analyst at Schaeffer’s Investment Research.

If the S&P clears 1258 by year-end, it would mark the third straight year of gains. The index remains about 11% below where it closed at the end of 2007.

Still, after closing at 1250 Wednesday, stocks need to commence a substantial two-day rally to get there.

U.S. stocks have been buoyed recently by signs of improvement in the US economy, including declines in weekly claims for unemployment benefits and an uptick in new home construction.

But investors say the market remains vulnerable as the debt crisis in Europe continues to threaten the outlook for the global economy and financial markets easy to get unsecured personal loans.

One bright spot for Europe on Wednesday was an Italian auction of 3- and 24-month bonds that drew strong demand and yields half as high as the previous month’s auctions. The results helped lift European equities and banks.

Investors will be more closely watching Thursday’s auction of Italian 10-year bonds, which have seen yields continue to flirt with the 7% danger zone. That level is worrisome because it flashed the first warning signs for Ireland, Portugal and Greece, which all eventually needed bailouts.

U.S. stocks ended a listless session little changed Tuesday as investors weighed reports on consumer confidence and home prices.

World markets: Europe’s markets finished lower. Britain’s FTSE 100 () eased 0.1%, the DAX () in Germany slumped 2% and France’s CAC 40 () lost 1%

Economists a bit more optimistic

Asian markets ended mixed. The Shanghai Composite () rose 0.2%, the Hang Seng () in Hong Kong fell 0.6% and Japan’s Nikkei () lost 0.2%.

Currencies and commodities: Oil prices eased off the previous sessions spike, slipping $1.64 to $99.70 a barrel. On Tuesday, crude prices jumped 2% after Iran threatened to choke off the flow of oil passing through the Strait of Hormuz.

Gold futures for February delivery fell $31.40 to $1,564.10 an ounce.

The dollar fell against the British pound and the Japanese yen but edged higher against the euro.

Companies: Shares in the financial sector remained under pressure throughout the trading day.

Top stocks of 2011

Citigroup (, Fortune 500), Credit Suisse (), Wells Fargo (, Fortune 500), Morgan Stanley (, Fortune 500), Goldman Sachs (, Fortune 500) and Bank of America (, Fortune 500) closed down between 1% and 4%.

Bonds: The price on the benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury moved up sharply, with the yield falling to 1.928% from 2.01% from late Tuesday.  

Source

Yemeni soldiers battled al-Qaida-linked militants Monday outside the southern city of Zinjibar, which remains partly under the control of the Islamists. Five soldiers and four fighters were killed, a military official said.

The intense fighting in northern and eastern Zinjibar included artillery and rocket shelling on militant hideouts, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity in line with military regulations.

He said the military units were engaged in pitched battles with armed gangs deployed on the streets, and have advanced on areas controlled by the militants.

At least 60 people, including 23 soldiers, have been killed in the fighting since last week.

Islamic militants, including some with links to the al-Qaida branch in Yemen, seized control of Zinjibar and another town in April and May. They were taking advantage of the turmoil surrounding the popular uprising against President Ali Abdullah Saleh to expand their area of operations.

Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula was behind several nearly successful attempts to attack U.S. targets, including the failed attempt to down a passenger jet bound for Detroit on Christmas Day 2009. Washington believes it is the most dangerous of several al-Qaida’s offshoots around the globe.

President Saleh has cooperated with the U.S. in fighting the group and used the threat of al-Qaida in arguing that he could not relinquish power in Yemen despite the protests calling for him to go since February payday loans.

The U.S. withdrew its support of Saleh in the summer, and the autocratic leader signed a deal last month to transfer power in exchange for immunity from prosecution over the deaths of protesters and corruption during his 33 years in power.

The deal has failed to quell the protests in Yemen, which have recently expanded to include labor strikes, calling for Saleh loyalists to be removed from office and for Saleh to be put on trial.

On Monday, Yemen’s military agreed to replace a commander accused of corruption, apparently settling a brief strike by 1,000 soldiers, said Anwar Abdullah, an officer in a military department that deals with public affairs and army morale. Abdullah said that the strikers demanded the ouster of department head Maj. Gen. Ali al-Shater for mismanagement, accusing him of running his own prison, in which some soldiers were jailed even for minor offenses. Some were kept in chains.

Abdullah said after the prime minister intervened in the dispute Monday, it was agreed that al-Shater would be replaced.

The soldiers said they would end their strike when the defense minister appoints a new commander.

Source

Four Yemeni soldiers and two al-Qaida-linked militants were killed in clashes in the country’s south, military and medical officials said Sunday.

The fighting took place overnight outside the city of Zinjibar, the capital of Abyan province that Islamic militants seized earlier this year, a military official said. A medical official said six soldiers were wounded in the fighting.

Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to talk to the media.

Al-Qaida-linked militants have overrun swaths of territory in Abyan, taking advantage of a security vacuum that has developed as a result of Yemen’s ongoing political unrest amid nine months of massive protests demanding the ouster of President Ali Abdullah Saleh.

Fighting with the militants has continued as Yemen tries to emerge from its crisis. Saleh is due to step down by the end of the month in return for immunity from prosecution under a deal he signed last month. Under the U.S.- and Saudi-backed deal, a national unity government has already been formed, bringing in opposition parties.

Vice President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi has also formed a military committee joining both pro-regime forces and military units that defected to the opposition. On Saturday, the committee had succeeded in removing fighters, weapons and equipment of both sides from two main streets of the capital, Sanaa. But armed pockets of the rival forces could still be seen in side streets nearby.

The U.N. secretary-general’s envoy to Yemen, Jamal bin Omar, told reporters before he left Yemen Saturday that the military committee should end its work next Saturday in separating the rival sides, which at times engaged in heavy battles in the capital.

Gen. Ali Mohsen al-Ahmar, the commander of the First Armored Division who defected and joined the protesters in March, expressed his backing for the military committee after meeting Sunday with ambassadors supervising enforcement of the deal.

Source