LITTLE ROCK — QUOTE OF THE DAY
“We got back to what’s more of a square position, closer to where we want to be, and
now we’re going to take a couple of deep breaths and reassess what this really means.”
Jerry Webman,
chief economist with Oppenheimer Funds Article, 2D Oil-and-gas drilling-rig count up by 8
HOUSTON - The number of rigs actively exploring for oil and natural gas in the U.S. rose by eight this week to 2,021.
Houston-based drilling-products provider Baker Hughes Inc. reported Friday that 1,078 rigs were exploring for oil and 934 for natural gas. Nine were listed as miscellaneous. A year ago this week the rig count stood at 1,672.
Of the major oil- and gas-producing states, Texas gained seven rigs, Oklahoma picked up three, and Arkansas and Pennsylvania each gained one.
Louisiana lost two rigs and Alaska, Colorado and Wyoming were each down one. The count in California, New Mexico, North Dakota and West Virginia was unchanged.
The rig count peaked at 4,530 in 1981. A low of 488 was recorded in 1999.
Chrysler CEO opposes 2-tier wages
The head of Chrysler said Friday that the car maker’s two-class wage system has to go.
Chief Executive Officer Sergio Marchionne said Chrysler needs one wage structure in its next contract with the United Auto Workers. Negotiations for that contract start in 2015.
He said the current system creates two classes of workers. New workers in the bottom tier make about half as much money as longtime union members.
Marchionne didn’t say how he would come up with one wage. But it’s likely he’ll try to reduce the pay of top-tier workers. General Motors and Ford could follow and pay could be cut for most of the union’s 112,000 members.
Union workers approved a four-year contract with Chrysler on Wednesday. It includes raises for bottom-tier workers.
SEC: Brokers’ group doctored papers
WASHINGTON - The main self-policing organization for brokers and stock markets misled the government by altering documents sought by federal regulators, the Securities and Exchange Commission charged Thursday.
Financial Industry Regulatory Authority Inc., a private organization responsible for overseeing much of the U.S. financial industry, altered minutes of staff meetings before turning them over to SEC inspectors in 2008, the SEC said.
“Specifically, certain information was deleted or edited, while in other instances, entire passages were removed or changed,” the SEC said in an administrative order.
It was the third time the industry group’s employees have given SEC inspectors altered or misleading documents over the past eight years, the SEC said. Similar episodes occurred in 2004 and 2005, the SEC said.
Despite the fact that the organization took steps to address those “document integrity problems,” it “has not ensured the integrity of documents provided to the Commission,” the SEC said.
Without admitting or denying wrongdoing in the latest case, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority agreed to take more remedial steps and to “cease and desist” from similar violations, the SEC said.
The SEC relies to a great extent on the organization because it oversees matters as diverse as insider trading, the workings of the financial markets and the treatment of investors by their stock brokers.
GM to shut Shreveport unit in August
General Motors Co. will keep open until August 2012 the mid-size pickup plant in Shreveport that it had marked for closure as part of a new four-year labor contract.
The Shreveport factory making Chevrolet Colorado and GMC Canyon trucks will close Aug. 23, Kim Carpenter, a spokesman for Detroit-based GM, said Friday. The closing date is dependent on pickup orders by dealers and customers, she said. Shreveport is the only assembly plant that the automaker and United Auto Workers agreed would close as part of their new contract, which was ratified Sept. 28.
GM confirmed that it will continue selling the Colorado pickup, which is smaller than its Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra trucks, in an Oct. 10 statement.
The union has said the company agreed to build mid-size trucks in its Wentzville, Mo., factory that makes full-size vans.
The union planned to continue pushing GM to postpone closing the Shreveport plant and find stamping or other work to replace the vehicle assembly operation, said Joe Ashton, the union’s vice president for GM relations.
Oil-field firm to hire 50 for Searcy shop Baker Hughes, a Houston-based oil-field service company, is seeking to hire 50 workers for its Searcy operation and will hold a jobs fair from 9 a.m. till 3 p.m. today at 180 Lee Lane in Searcy.
Baker Hughes is looking for mechanics and electronic technicians for its new repair and maintenance facility, which will open early next year in Searcy, said Pam Easton, a spokesman for the company.
Baker Hughes plans to fill 1,500 jobs nationwide, Easton said.
Prospective workers need to have a high school diploma or equivalent, be at least 18 years old and be able to pass a pre-employment background and drug screening.
The company prefers that prospects have a commercial driver’s license.
FDIC ends sanction of bank in Rogers
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. has ended its three year-old sanction of Parkway Bank of Rogers, the federal regulator said Friday.
The sanction ended Sept. 28 but was not publicized until Friday.
Parkway is the first Arkansas bank in recent years to have federal regulators drop an order against it. There are another 16 banks in Arkansas still under some form of federal regulatory order. Two other banks - ANB Financial of Rogers in 2008 and First Southern Bank last year - have failed.
The FDIC issued a cease-and-desist order against Parkway Bank on Aug. 5, 2008. Only two other banks have been under federal regulatory orders longer, Legacy National Bank of Springdale since April 24, 2008, and Metropolitan National Bank of Little Rock since May 22, 2008.
Parkway’s problems were centered on failed real estate loans in Northwest Arkansas.
Business, Pages 34 on 10/29/2011