Business news in brief

India carrier lacks planes, officials say

NEW DELHI -- SpiceJet Ltd. won't be able to meet its flight plans for the summer schedule starting March 29 after the Indian budget carrier failed to obtain enough jets, people familiar with the matter said.

SpiceJet, which operates 17 Boeing 737 jets and 15 Bombardier Q400s, won't be able to offer 280 daily flights as planned, company officials said. The airline currently handles 218 flights a day but has been unable to take bookings on some of the planned new flights because of the lack of planes, the officials said.

Failure to meet its announced schedule could raise concerns about whether SpiceJet, which ran into financial trouble last year, can succeed on its recovery path. One official said the carrier is in talks with lessors who went to court demanding to take back jets for nonpayment.

SpiceJet co-founder Ajay Singh bailed out the company in February after lessors took away its planes for not paying monthly rentals.

-- The Associated Press

Carnival earnings boosted by cheap fuel

Carnival Corp., the world's largest cruise-line operator, posted first-quarter earnings that beat analysts' estimates, benefiting from lower fuel costs and higher passenger spending.

Adjusted earnings per share in the three months ended Feb. 28 totaled 20 cents, Miami-based Carnival said Friday. Total sales fell 1.5 percent to $3.53 billion. On-board revenue rose 4.6 percent to $889 million.

Carnival has been recovering from a slump after the wreck of its Costa Concordia in 2012 and a fire aboard the Carnival Triumph a year later. On Thursday, the company said it ordered nine new vessels to join its 101-ship fleet starting in 2019.

Carnival shares rose $2.70, or 6 percent, to close Friday at $47.12.

-- Bloomberg News

Ex-Ford CEO's pay falls to $22M in '14

DEARBORN, Mich. -- Former Ford Chief Executive Officer Alan Mulally's compensation fell 5 percent to $22 million in his final year at the company, reflecting lower profits as the company invested heavily in new vehicles and plants.

Ford reported 2014 compensation Friday in its proxy filing with the federal government.

Mulally, 69, retired July 1. As a result, he earned $1 million in salary compared with $2 million in 2013. He did not receive a bonus in 2014 but did earn $13.9 million in stock and option awards, down 5 percent from a year ago.

Among his benefits upon retirement: a free car.

In his eight years at Ford, Mulally earned a total of $219.65 million. His pay was the subject of some anger at Ford's manufacturing plants, but he was widely credited with bringing the company back to profitability after its near-bankruptcy in 2006.

Mulally's successor, Mark Fields, saw his total compensation jump 47 percent to $14.9 million. Fields became Ford's president and CEO on July 1.

-- The Associated Press

EPA: 11% of drilling chemicals secret

The Environmental Protection Agency found 11 percent of ingredients used by oil and gas drillers in hydraulic fracturing were listed as business secrets and not disclosed on an industry-managed website.

The EPA analyzed the information that companies post to the FracFocus database as part of its overall study of fracking, in which water, sand and chemicals are shot underground to free trapped gas or oil. The process has spurred a U.S. energy boom.

The agency compiled the records on the website into a database and then analyzed the results. It said 70 percent of the disclosures it analyzed included at least one ingredient that was kept secret as confidential business information.

-- Bloomberg News

Greece said ready for 'rupture' in talks

ATHENS, Greece -- Greece's government is prepared for a "rupture" with creditors in its bailout talks and is being deliberately vague about its intentions as a negotiating tactic, Cabinet minister Euclid Tsakalotos said Friday.

Separately, a government official said Greece has made clear during negotiations with the eurozone and International Monetary Fund that the country "will not continue servicing its public debt through its own means if the creditors don't proceed directly with the disbursement of [bailout] installments delayed since 2014."

The official spoke only on condition of anonymity, in line with government rules.

Greece has been unable to borrow on international markets since 2010 because of high borrowing rates that reflect a lack of investor confidence in the country. It has relied since then on funds from a bailout from other eurozone countries and the International Monetary Fund.

But its creditors are refusing to release the last installment, worth more than $7.6 billion, unless the government produces an acceptable list of changes by Monday.

-- The Associated Press

FCC head knocks Net neutrality foes

WASHINGTON -- The nation's biggest broadband providers oppose tough Net neutrality regulations because they want "unfettered power" over the Internet, the head of the Federal Communications Commission said Friday.

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said the "avalanche of arguments" against regulations designed to ensure the free flow of online traffic showed that the industry's major firms have ulterior motives.

"We should conclude that the biggest broadband providers in the land have one objective -- to operate free from control by their customers and free from oversight from government," Wheeler said in a speech at Ohio State University.

The Democratic-controlled FCC approved the regulations last month. They prohibit broadband providers from blocking, slowing or selling faster delivery of legal content flowing through their networks to consumers.

Broadband providers have said they are committed to those principles, but they opposed the FCC's decision to enact the rules by classifying broadband as a more highly regulated telecommunications service.

-- Los Angeles Times

Business on 03/28/2015

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