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AP Business NewsBrief at 3:58 p.m. EDT
[July 27, 2008]

AP Business NewsBrief at 3:58 p.m. EDT


(AP Online Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Readings on economy, jobs could dominate tradingNEW YORK (AP) _ Investors head into the week with a bit more resolve that U.S. companies are doing a better-than-expected job managing their way through an economy stifled by unprecedented turmoil in the housing and credit markets. Wall Street is about midway through second-quarter earnings season, and the overall results haven't been as dreary as some analysts feared. About 61 percent of the Standard & Poor's 500 index companies reporting results so far have surpassed projections, and 72 percent of them were able to top last year's sales figures.



As costs rise, inflation's next front is retailersNEW YORK (AP) _ Coming to a store near you: Even higher prices. Most inflation this year has come from food and fuel, as retailers resisted passing along to strapped consumers the higher prices manufacturers charged them, but coming increases from companies such as Johnson & Johnson and Hasbro Inc. may leave them with no choice. "While these increases have not for the most part been passed on at the retail level, it is inevitable that they will be at some point," said Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research. "Car dealers and other retailers cannot continue to absorb rising costs at the wholesale level and not pass some of these increases on to consumers."

SemGroup co-founder reassures employees amid probeTULSA, Okla. (AP) _ SemGroup LP co-founder Tom Kivisto this weekend attempted to reassure employees of the embattled company, following his removal as chief executive and president amid investigations by federal regulators and the U.S. Attorney's Office. "Tulsa has always rebounded well when bad things happen to one of its corporate citizens," Kivisto said Saturday at a news conference where he refused to take questions from the media.


Survey: National gas prices dip below $4 gallonCAMARILLO, Calif. (AP) _ A national survey shows gas prices have dropped a fraction below the $4-dollar mark. The average price of regular gasoline at self-serve stations was $3.996 a gallon Friday. Mid-grade was $4.13 a gallon and premium went for $4.24. That's according to the Lundberg Survey of 7,000 gas stations nationwide, released Sunday.

Blackwater mixes business glitz with military gritMOYOCK, N.C. (AP) _ Erik Prince gets his guests to the runway seconds before the turboprop's approach. The financiers hop out of his black Chevy Suburban and gawk as the pilots drop a pair of packages that float to within feet of their target _ just as they might on a mission for Blackwater Worldwide in the Afghan backcountry. His audience is captivated by the show, but the Blackwater founder and CEO focuses on a seemingly minor detail: the parachutes.

Some 52,000 Lufthansa workers plan for strikeBERLIN (AP) _ Frankfurt and Hamburg airports will be the hardest hit on Monday when 52,000 employees of Lufthansa AG go on strike, a union official said Sunday. All other German airports served by Germany's biggest airline will also be affected by the massive walkout, Ver.di spokesman Harald Reutter told The Associated Press.

An un-American feel aids expanding US Web firmsNEW YORK (AP) _ AOL splashes images of Bollywood celebrities on its new home page for India. MySpace accepts sign-ups from mobile phones in Japan. Google departs from its customarily spartan home page and peppers its Korean site with colorful, animated icons. As major U.S. Internet companies stake their ground abroad in anticipation of the next billion people coming online _ and the advertising revenue they might generate _ the flags they are planting aren't the Stars and Stripes.

FDA faulted over unapproved uses of medicationsWASHINGTON (AP) _ When a state trooper pulls over a speeding motorist, the officer usually writes out a ticket on the spot. When federal regulators catch a drug company peddling prescription medications for an unapproved use, it takes them an average of seven months to issue a warning, according to a draft report by congressional investigators. It typically takes four more months for the company to fix the problem. During that time, a lot prescriptions can be written.

Professionals find jobs back in rural hometownsLEBANON, Va. (AP) _ Software engineer Keith Brown was conducting a meeting by teleconference when he had to call an abrupt halt. Dido, one of the family's two dogs, had just brought in a dead opossum. Welcome to the professional life in this slice of rural southwest Virginia.

US racketeering law is tested in MoscowMOSCOW (AP) _ Russian authorities are hoping to make legal history by applying an American racketeering law in a Moscow court as they seek to recover billions of dollars in damages from the Bank of New York Mellon. Hearings resume Monday in the Russian Federal Customs Service's $22.5 billion lawsuit against the bank, which was at the center of a major money-laundering scandal in the late 1990s.

Copyright ? 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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