QUOTE OF THE DAY
“The bullet missed them. I don’t think this even damaged the vegetable crops, tomatoes and strawberries, which are more susceptible.”
Dale Mohler, an AccuWeather Inc. senior meteorologist, on cold temperatures in Florida Article, 1D
Fort Smith jobless rate state’s only drop
The Fort Smith metropolitan statistical area was the only metropolitan area in Arkansas to see a decline in its unemployment rate in November, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics said Tuesday.
Fort Smith had an unemployment rate of 6.9 percent in November, down from 7.3 percent in November 2012.
Northwest Arkansas had the lowest unemployment rate in the state in November at 4.8 percent, up from 4.7 percent a year earlier. The Little Rock metropolitan area’s unemployment rate was 6.1 percent, up from 5.8 percent in November 2012.
Arkansas’ unemployment rate in November was 7.5 percent, and the national rate was 7 percent.
Other state metropolitan area unemployment rates in November compared with November 2012 were:
Jonesboro, 6.3 percent, up from 6.2 percent.
Texarkana, 6.8 percent, up from 6 percent.
Hot Springs, 7.5 percent, up from 6.8 percent.
Pine Bluff, 9.5 percent, up from 8.4 percent.
French unions sue over 10 p.m. closing
French unions are suing retailer Printemps for keeping its flagship Paris department store open until 10 p.m. on Thursdays, saying the late hours break labor regulations.
The extended opening “violates labor law on a grand scale” and is “particularly harmful for the health of workers and forces them to sacrifice their private life for the diktats of company profits and the unlimited extension of working hours,” the CFDT and CGT unions said Tuesday in a joint statement.
The court action underlines the balancing act President Francois Hollande’s government faces as it tries to satisfy both its traditional labor supporters and revive an economy that has barely grown in two years. The government is already holding talks with unions about Sunday openings after retailers broke the law to keep their stores open seven days a week.
Goodyear bosses released in France
AMIENS, France - Two Goodyear managers held captive by angry French workers were freed Tuesday after police intervened, ending a two-day standoff over the factory’s bleak future.
The release outraged union members, who made a tire bonfire in front of the plant. It also left unresolved the larger problems that have dogged the factory in Amiens in northern France, which Goodyear has tried to sell or shutter for more than five years. Union leaders said Tuesday that workers would occupy the factory complex until managers negotiate with them over severance pay.
Workers, having failed so far to save their jobs, seized the plant’s director and human resources chief on Monday morning to demand bigger severance packages.
The Amiens plant has seen violent protests in recent years, so a judge authorized police intervention.
A dozen police officers arrived at the plant Tuesday afternoon, and two went inside the facility. Minutes later, the two bosses walked out and got in an unmarked police car. They did not speak to reporters.
Official: EU’s crop policy slowing growth
Reluctance by European Union policymakers to accept genetically modified crops and approve new varieties may slow investment in agricultural technology in the bloc, U.K.
Environment Secretary Owen Paterson said Tuesday.
Delays in granting licenses for gene-altered varieties have been “politically motivated,” instead of based on research, Paterson said in a speech at the Oxford Farming Conference in Oxford, England. Investors may be deterred from focusing on new farming technologies in Europe because of the regulatory standstill, he said. The European Union is expected to vote this month on a new strain of insect-resistant corn, which if allowed, would be the first so-called genetically modified variety approved in 15 years, he said.
“We will simply not have people prepared to invest in new technologies, whether they’re advances in crop breeding or whether they’re pesticides, if at a political level they are arbitrarily stopped,” Paterson said during a news conference after his speech. “That is a real problem for us having a competitive industry in Europe.”
- BLOOMBERG NEWS
Innocent of tax fraud, ex-Swiss banker says
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - A former top executive with Swiss bank UBS AG who was a fugitive for years pleaded innocent Tuesday to U.S. fraud conspiracy charges stemming from a broad federal tax evasion investigation.
Raoul Weil, 54, entered the plea in a Florida courtroom to charges first filed in 2008. He was a fugitive until his arrest in October in Bologna, Italy, and he was later extradited to the U.S. He is free on a $10.5 million bond, but he can reside or travel only in south Florida, New Jersey and southern New York.
Prosecutors say Weil, who left UBS in 2009, conspired as its chief of global wealth management to hide $20 billion in assets from the Internal Revenue Service using secret overseas accounts for thousands of wealthy customers. Weil’s New York-based attorney, Aaron Marcu, said Weil will fight the charges.
“We look forward to coming back to Florida and defending him when we have a trial date,” Marcu told U.S. Magistrate Judge Alicia Valle at a brief hearing.
- The Associated Press
Hotel buying continues in New Orleans
NEW ORLEANS - A flurry of hotel transactions in the New Orleans market continues, with a large French Quarter hotel and a boutique property selling within the past month.
The Astor Crowne Plaza Hotel at Canal and Bourbon streets and the Royal St. Charles Hotel on St. Charles Avenue were sold within the past month.
The Astor Crowne Plaza was sold in early December to Starwood Capital Group, a Greenwich, Conn.-based investment management company.
While the 697-room property sold for $77 million according to conveyance records, the deal is believed to have a total value of more than $116 million when including debt that burdened previous owners.
Lowe Enterprises Investors announced Monday morning it acquired the Royal St. Charles Hotel on behalf of an unidentified investment client. The seller, Jon Kline of Newport Beach, Calif., also owns the Renaissance Arts and Renaissance Pere Marquette hotels in New Orleans.
- The Associated Press
Business, Pages 26 on 01/08/2014