“More Business - San Francisco Chronicle” plus 4 more |
- More Business - San Francisco Chronicle
- Johnson City police arrest mechanic, say he was charging to fix cars ... - WREG
- Layoffs, trial delays forecast for Alabama courts - NewOrleans.Com
- California's Dunhill Insurance Executives Charged with Municipal Bond ... - Insurance Journal
- Cost cuts lead Washington Post to big profit jump - Daily Business Review
| More Business - San Francisco Chronicle Posted: 30 Oct 2009 08:45 AM PDT The company called off the deal on Thursday after the markets closed, citing "market conditions." AEI is the first company in 2009 to withdraw its IPO just before it priced. AEI, a former Enron entity with energy-infrastructure operations in 19 developing countries, had expected shares to price between $14 and $16 per share. The company was offering 16.7 million shares. Its largest shareholder, Ashmore Funds, planned to sell 33.3 million. Thursday, AEI lowered its expected price range to $12 to $13 per share. It raised its offering to 20 million shares, while Ashmore Funds cut its offering to just 1 million shares. AEI, based in the Cayman Islands, carries a lot of baggage, including political, currency and credit risk, said Francis Gaskins, president of IPOdesktop. The company's income statement especially seemed to drive away investor interest, he said. For the first six months of the year, the company's net income jumped 58 percent, driven by lower natural gas prices. But revenue for the period fell 20 percent to $3.7 billion, mostly hurt by currency devaluations in some countries. "These are issues beyond their control - they can't control their income statement," Gaskins said. These concerns, along with a high-priced offering, turned investors away. John Fitzgibbon, founder of IPO Scoop, said the IPO market is fragile right now, leaving investors wary of touching a company like AEI, which is loaded with uncertainties. "Today's IPO market is rising from its ashes," Fitzgibbon said. Investors are hungry for stability and transparency, which is why Vitamin Shoppe Inc. was able to raise more than it had expected in its initial public offering on Wednesday, he said. The retailer of fish oil, sports nutrition products and vitamins priced 9.1 million shares at $17 each, above the expected range of $14 to $16. In its offering, Vitamin Shoppe presented a company with "plain numbers," which entailed a good growth record, profitability, and not that much stock, Fitzgibbon said. A representative for AEI did not immediately return calls for comment. This content has passed through fivefilters.org. | |
| Johnson City police arrest mechanic, say he was charging to fix cars ... - WREG Posted: 30 Oct 2009 04:42 AM PDT This content has passed through fivefilters.org. | |
| Layoffs, trial delays forecast for Alabama courts - NewOrleans.Com Posted: 30 Oct 2009 08:38 AM PDT Written by Associated Press Friday, 30 October 2009 04:46 Business News AP MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) - More than 20 percent of Alabama's court system employees might have to be laid off and jury trials postponed if its budget is cut as deeply as some have projected, the state's chief justice said. Gov. Bob Riley's administration has warned most non-education state agencies that they will get 9 percent less than the Legislature appropriated for them during the first nine months of the fiscal year that began Oct. 1. The cut is due to the recession pushing state revenue lower than expected. "If we took the same cuts as the state agencies, we'd have to lay off 500 to 600 people" out of 2,600, Chief Justice Sue Bell Cobb, who leads the state court system, said Thursday. Cobb said the courts would have to look at delaying all types of trials, except for criminal trials in counties with jail overcrowding problems. The Legislature appropriated $186.7 million for Alabama's trial and appellate courts. That was supposed to be up from the scaled-backed budget of $180.3 million in the previous fiscal year. But state revenue isn't coming in as fast as state officials expected when the Legislature approved this year's appropriations. That prompted Riley's administration to begin making cuts. If courts took the same cuts as other state operations, the appropriation would drop below last year's level. Court officials and the Riley administration have been in negotiations about the cuts since September. "There is no choice but to reduce spending in all sectors of state government," said Todd Stacy, Riley's press secretary. Cuts hadn't been set for the court system yet, he said. Cobb said judicial officials understand the state government's financial problems. "If there are layoffs in the executive branch, we will lay off in the judicial branch," she said. Callie Dietz, Alabama's administrative director of courts, said the system is different from many state operations. It doesn't get a lot of federal funds. Instead, 92 percent of its money comes from the state budget. Also, 97 percent of its funding goes for personnel costs. That means the court system can't obtain big savings by delaying equipment purchases or building maintenance. If the system has to take a big cut, it will be a repeat of Riley's first year in office in 2003, when the state's financial problems caused court officials to lay off employees and curtail the hours that circuit clerks' offices were open. Funding improved, but there was never enough to rehire all those who were let go, Dietz said. At the same time the court system is looking at financial problems, workers are busy repairing the state judicial building in downtown Montgomery. The limestone structure houses Dietz' staff and the state's appellate courts. Dietz said the work is separate from the court system's state budget funding. The work is being done with a $10 million bond issue approved by the Legislature to fix leaks that caused judicial officials to put out buckets during every rain storm.  This content has passed through fivefilters.org. | |
| California's Dunhill Insurance Executives Charged with Municipal Bond ... - Insurance Journal Posted: 30 Oct 2009 06:07 AM PDT A California financial products firm, two current executives and a former executive were indicted on Thursday for bid rigging and fraud related to municipal bond contracts, the Justice Department said. Dunhill Insurance Services Inc, also known as CDR Financial Products Inc, was named in the indictment filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. In August, CDR Financial Products was under investigation by a federal grand jury in Albuquerque. It was trying to determine if CDR Financial Products improperly won more than $1.4 million in work for the state of New Mexico shortly after making contributions to political action committees linked to New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson. The department said the charges were the first to be filed in its ongoing bid-rigging investigation into the municipal bond industry. (Reporting by Jeremy Pelofsky and Diane Bartz; Editing by Tim Dobbyn) Comments? Click here to post a comment about this article This content has passed through fivefilters.org. | |
| Cost cuts lead Washington Post to big profit jump - Daily Business Review Posted: 30 Oct 2009 08:02 AM PDT
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