Tuna firms to settle in Walmart lawsuit
Walmart Inc. has agreed to a settlement valued at about $20.5 million in an antitrust claim against tuna producer StarKist Co. An additional $4.5 million to be paid by other, unnamed companies brings the total settlement to about $25 million, Walmart spokesman Randy Hargrove said Monday.
A lawsuit that Walmart filed Oct. 31, 2016, in U.S. District Court, Western District of Arkansas claimed StarKist, Bumble Bee Foods and Thai Union Group, parent company of Chicken of the Sea, conspired to raise prices for packaged tuna between 2010 and 2015. During that period, the Bentonville retailer bought about $400 million worth of packaged tuna products from those companies.
The suit was transferred to the Southern District of California in November 2016 and was amended in May 2017 to include a number of other companies that Walmart said took part in the price-fixing scheme.
U.S. retailers, wholesalers and food-service companies began filing antitrust lawsuits against the three tuna producers in 2015. Those suits spurred the U.S. Department of Justice to start a criminal investigation.
Walmart settled with Thai Union Group in May 2018 under undisclosed terms. The retailer "is still working to resolve our claims against Bumble Bee," Hargrove said.
-- Serenah McKay
Airline sees gains on Spa City-Dallas route
Southern Airways Express carried nearly 9,000 passengers on its scheduled flights between Hot Springs Memorial Field and Dallas in 2018, a 71 percent increase over the previous year, the Memphis-based air carrier said.
The 8,937 Southern Airways commercial passengers were the most at the airport since records have been kept, the airline said in a news release. The previous record was set in 2006, when there were 7,585 commercial passengers.
Southern Airways uses nine-seat Cessna 208 Caravan single-engine aircraft to fly 18 weekly round-trip flights between Memorial Field and Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport.
The airline receives a $2.4 million annual subsidy from the U.S. Department of Transportation under the agency's Essential Air Service program. Southern Airways also provides commercial air service in Harrison and El Dorado.
-- Noel Oman
State index up 0.01, closes day at 412.23
The Arkansas Index, a price-weighted index that tracks the largest public companies based in the state, inched up 0.01 to 412.23 Monday.
"U.S. stocks ended off their lows on Monday after warnings from Caterpillar and Nvidia added to concerns about a slowing Chinese economy and tariffs taking a bite out of U.S. corporate profits," said Chris Harkins, managing director with Raymond James & Associates in Little Rock.
The index was developed by Bloomberg News and the Democrat-Gazette with a base value of 100 as of Dec. 30, 1997.
Business on 01/29/2019