Icahn sells American Railcar for $1.34B
ST. CHARLES, Mo. -- Billionaire investor Carl Icahn agreed to sell American Railcar Industries Inc. for $1.34 billion, quintupling his investment as a freight boom spurs a rebound in demand for rail equipment.
Icahn Enterprises agreed to sell the maker of tank and hopper cars at $70 a share, 51 percent above its closing price Friday, to a subsidiary of hedge fund ITE Management. The deal is valued at $1.75 billion including debt, St. Charles, Mo.-based American Railcar said in a statement Monday.
American Railcar has manufacturing facilities in Paragould and Marmaduke.
Rail carloads are climbing as the robust U.S. economy drives freight demand and as a shortage of truck drivers pushes some cargo to trains. Orders for freight cars jumped 35 percent to 23,788 in the second quarter from a year earlier, according to the Railway Supply Institute. It was the biggest quarter for rail-car orders since the end of 2014.
Icahn's sale marks a retreat from a previous attempt to consolidate the rail-equipment industry after he acquired a majority interest in American Railcar in 2010.
Icahn Enterprises said the investment in American Railcar has generated a total return of 423 percent. He stepped down as chairman of the company in 2014.
-- Bloomberg News
Payless to auction Kansas headquarters
TOPEKA, Kan. -- The Topeka headquarters of Payless Shoesource will be auctioned online this week after more jobs were eliminated by the company.
The company on Friday eliminated 35 merchandising positions in Topeka as part of what it calls a new merchandising structure. The jobs will either transfer to Dallas or not be filled.
The online auction of the nearly 307,000-square-foot headquarters will be held through Wednesday, with a starting bid of $1.25 million.
The Topeka Capital-Journal reports Payless officials haven't said exactly how many jobs have been eliminated in Topeka or if any divisions will be left there. At least 350 employees have been laid off, but more positions were moved to Dallas.
Payless has been restructuring after emerging from bankruptcy. It is relocating most of its corporate headquarters to Dallas.
-- The Associated Press
Creator of external pacemaker dies at 94
MINNEAPOLIS -- Earl Bakken, an electronics repairman who created the first wearable external pacemaker and co-founded one of the world's largest medical device companies, Medtronic, has died. He was 94.
Bakken, who also commercialized the first implantable pacemaker in 1960, died Sunday at his home in Hawaii, Medtronic said in a statement. It didn't give a cause of death.
Bakken and his brother-in-law, Palmer Hermundslie, formed Medtronic in 1949 and turned it from a struggling company they ran out of the Hermundlie family's Minneapolis garage into a multinational medical technology powerhouse.
Bakken and Hermundslie formed Medtronic to repair and modify hospital equipment. In 1958, University of Minnesota heart surgeon Dr. C. Walton Lillehei asked Bakken to make a battery-powered pacemaker that could keep babies with irregular heartbeats alive. Until then, patients with irregular heartbeats had to plug their cumbersome external devices into wall outlets, limiting their movement and leaving them susceptible to power outages, according to the company.
Bakken delivered his device to the university's animal lab for testing and was stunned to see it attached to one of Lillehei's pediatric patients the next day.
-- The Associated Press
Hasbro to cut jobs after disappointing 3Q
NEWARK, N.J. -- Hasbro, wrestling with the demise of Toys R Us and elusive shoppers spending a lot more on high-tech gadgets, fell well short of third-quarter expectations Monday and said it will cut some jobs to save costs.
The toy maker, whose brands include Monopoly and Play-Doh, did not specify the exact number of cuts, but said it will affect a "mid-single digit" percentage of its worldwide workforce. Hasbro had about 5,400 employees at the end of last year; a 5 percent cut would put the layoffs at about 270 jobs. Hasbro said it will absorb charges of as much as $60 million in the next quarter related to paying severance.
Hasbro Inc.'s third-quarter earnings slipped to $263.9 million, or $2.06 per share. Adjusted for pretax gains, per-share earnings were $1.93, far below Wall Street projections for per-share earnings of $2.24, according to a survey by Zacks Investment Research. Revenue of $1.57 billion also missed analyst expectations for $1.71 billion.
-- The Associated Press
FICO firm plans new type of credit score
SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Credit scores are about to get a tweak that might help those with weaker credit.
Fair Isaac Corp., the company behind the widely used FICO score, announced Monday that it will begin testing a new type of credit score next year with credit reporting agency Experian and technology company Finicity.
The new UltraFICO score requires consumers to agree to share added personal information, such as data from their personal checking, savings or money market accounts. The extra information is intended to provide a more in-depth picture of how they use their money and build on traditional information for credit scores, which are based largely on payment history.
It would potentially improve the credit score of many Americans, particularly those with weak credit or limited credit history. And it would provide a broader base of customers for banks to lend to.
The companies estimate that 79 million Americans have subprime credit scores, which it puts at 680 or below. And 53 million Americans do not have enough data to generate a FICO score.
-- The Associated Press
Interim CBS chief to resign, cites health
NEW YORK -- CBS Corp. says that Richard Parsons, its interim chairman, has resigned from its board because of illness.
The media company named Strauss Zelnick, another media industry leader, as his replacement.
CBS named Parsons interim chairman in September as it tried to reshape itself following the ouster of its longtime chief Les Moonves.
Parsons said in a statement Sunday that he was already dealing with multiple myeloma when he joined the board, but "unanticipated complications have created additional new challenges" and that his doctors have advised he cut back on his commitments to ensure recovery.
His successor, Zelnick, currently serves as chief executive officer and chairman of interactive entertainment company Take-Two Interactive Software Inc.
-- The Associated Press
Business on 10/23/2018