AP
Business
Highlights
Wednesday
July 9, 7:05 pm ET
Stocks tumble on uneasiness about
financials
While many financial services companies logged steep declines
during the session, government-sponsored lenders Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae
were among those hardest hit. Investors are worried that the mortgage finance
companies will have to sell more shares than anticipated to compensate for
losses from the housing slump. Merrill Lynch & Co. also dropped, after
Fitch Ratings put its long-term credit default rating on watch for a possible
downgrade.
With dismal bank and lender earnings expected in the coming
weeks, investors were unable to keep buying a day after stocks, including
financials, had logged sharp gains. Investors are bracing for financial
companies to take another series of major credit-related write-downs, but the uncertainty
about how large they'll be is weighing on the market, said Scott Wren, senior
equity strategist at Wachovia Securities.
Selling accelerated amid light volume, which tends to skew price
moves.
Oil adds a penny on US data,
NEW YORK (AP) -- Oil prices finished about where they began
Wednesday after jumping more than $2 earlier on reports of lower U.S. oil
stockpiles and an Iranian missile test.
Light, sweet crude for August delivery rose
a penny to settle at $136.05 a barrel on the
The moves follow two days of steep declines that left prices 6.4
percent below last week's record high.
Figures from the Energy Information Administration showed
Prices often rise in response considerably to large drops in
Senate bows to Bush, approves surveillance bill
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Bowing to President Bush's demands, the Senate
sent the White House a bill Wednesday overhauling bitterly disputed rules on
secret government eavesdropping and shielding telecommunications companies from
lawsuits complaining they helped the
The relatively one-sided vote, 69-28, came only after a lengthy
and heated debate that pitted privacy and civil liberties concerns against the
desire to prevent terrorist attacks. It ended almost a year of wrangling over
surveillance rules and the president's warrantless wiretapping program that was
initiated after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
The House passed the same bill last month, and Bush said he would
sign it soon.
Opponents assailed the eavesdropping program, asserting that it
imperiled citizens' rights of privacy from government intrusion. But Bush said
the legislation protects those rights as well as Americans' security.
Northwest Airlines to cut 2,500 jobs
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) -- Northwest Airlines Corp. said on Wednesday it
will cut 2,500 jobs because of high oil prices, and will begin charging $15 to
check a single piece of luggage and as much as $100 to redeem a frequent-flier
award ticket.
The airline said it expects the new fees to add $250 million to
$300 million a year in revenue.
Northwest said the job cuts -- which represent about 8.3 percent
of its work force -- will include front-line and management workers. It said it
will start with voluntary departures and leaving open jobs unfilled before
moving to furloughs to reach the 2,500 total.
Northwest had said previously it would have fewer workers after
it cuts 8.5 percent to 9.5 percent of mainline flying in the fourth quarter of
this year. It has said overall capacity would shrink 3 percent to 4 percent
because it is adding regional seats. As of the end of 2007, Northwest employed
about 30,000 people.
President and Chief Executive Doug Steenland
said Northwest's fuel costs have more than doubled in the past year.
Salmonella toll tops 1,000; peppers now eyed
WASHINGTON (AP) -- More than 1,000 people now are confirmed ill
from salmonella initially linked to raw tomatoes, a grim milestone Wednesday
that makes this the worst foodborne outbreak in at
least a decade. Adding to the confusion, the government is implicating some
types of hot peppers, too.
Certain raw tomatoes -- red round, plum and Roma -- remain a
chief suspect and the government stressed again Wednesday that people should
avoid them unless they were harvested in areas cleared of suspicion.
But people at highest risk of severe illness from salmonella also
should not eat raw jalapeno and serrano peppers, the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention urged Wednesday. Those at highest
risk include the elderly, people with weak immune systems and infants.
There is evidence that raw jalapeno peppers may have caused some of
the illnesses, conclude CDC investigations of two clusters of sick people who
ate at the same restaurant or catered event.
Key developing nations reject G-8 climate plan
TOYAKO, Japan (AP) -- China,
The sharp criticism emerged at the close of a summit here of the
Group of Eight industrial powers that was dominated by the issue of how to
address the warming Earth. The G-8 leaders invited their counterparts from
fast-growing, pollution-emitting nations to sideline talks on the topic, but
the session merely showcased a widening rift over the best approach.
It was the final G-8 summit of Bush's presidency and he said
"significant progress" had been made on fighting global warming when
the leaders agreed to slash greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2050 and to insist
that developing nations be part of any new international agreement.
The "major economies" are the world's 16
largest-emitting nations, accounting for 80 percent of the world's air
pollution. The expanded meeting that included all of them was the first time
their leaders had sat down together for climate discussions.
AP Centerpiece: Rural stores pin hopes on high gas prices as
shoppers stay closer to home
THOMASVILLE, Ala. (AP) -- Residents in once-sleepy Thomasville
have started complaining about traffic jams on Route 43, which runs right
through the town.
Much of the new traffic is coming from shoppers, squeezed by
$4-per-gallon gas, who are staying closer to home instead of driving 100 miles
each way to the nearest malls in
Many stores in rural towns -- from small independent shops to
local chains -- are starting to enjoy a little life after years of seeing
customers bypass them for distant malls. While it may not reverse the
decades-long decline of small-town shopping, it could lead national mall
developers and merchants to rethink where to build and challenge a basic tenet
of retailing: Build, and shoppers will come from miles
away.
Some small shops in
By The Associated Press
The Dow fell 236.77, or 2.08 percent, to 11,147.44 a day after
rising more than 150 points.
The Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 29.01, or 2.28 percent,
to 1,244.69, while the Nasdaq
composite index fell 59.55, or 2.60 percent, to 2,234.89.
Light, sweet crude for August delivery rose
a penny to settle at $136.05 a barrel on the
In other Nymex trade, heating oil
futures fell 3.14 cents to $3.8516 a gallon while gasoline futures lost 1.77
cents to $3.3808 a gallon. Natural gas futures dropped 36.2 cents to $12.006
per 1,000 cubic feet.
August Brent crude rose 15 cents to $136.58 a barrel on the ICE
Futures exchange in