USD 259 has closed on a deal to buy 127 acres southeast of Wichita for a new high school.
The district bought the property Friday on the southeast side of 127th Street East and Pawnee from Wichita developer Gary Oborny, of Occidental Management.
Oborny declined to release the purchase price. The district has said the price was $1.56 million.
USD 259 plans to build a high school on the property next year as part of its $370 million bond issue. The school is expected to be open by the 2013-2014 school year.
Oborny retained about 30 acres on the corner for a future commercial development. He says the property isn’t likely to be developed for another five years, depending on how fast housing developments pop up in the area, which is mostly rural.
“If it happens sooner, it happens sooner. I can’t imagine it will,” Oborny says.
More information about Oborny’s plans can be found here.
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Debbie Yow hasn’t been on the job long, but she’s already making her presence felt as N.C. State’s athletics director.
“We are doing a reorganization,” Yow said in a phone interview Monday afternoon.
Yow, who took the helm of the Wolfpack athletic department in July, already has promoted department veteran David Horning to executive senior associate AD, making him the clear No. 2 administrator in the department. She also is looking to hire at least one, and possibly two, new senior associate ADs.
Additionally, Yow is shifting around some duties and responsibilities. The process will be complete in a couple of weeks, she says, and then the changes will be reviewed again a year from now.
Yow, who previously served as AD at the University of Maryland, says that she doesn’t intend to fire any employees as part of the reorganization and hasn’t heard of any employees that are leaving voluntarily.
Yow replaced Lee Fowler as AD. Fowler stepped down from the post after a decade as AD.
Google’s second quarter didn’t do much to help get the company’s stock out of its current rut.
The world’s online search leader reported a quarterly profit on Thursday that rose from its year-ago results but missed Wall Street’s forecasts. Though quarterly earnings rose 24% from a year earlier — healthy by any standards — it’s far from the nearly 40% average growth rate that Google posted over the past five years.
The company said its non-core businesses are growing nicely, most notably in the mobile field. Google reported that its advertising partners are becoming more receptive to mobile-specific advertising, and smart phones running its Android operating system are selling at a rate of 160,000 a day.
"We saw strength in every major product area, as more and more traditional brand advertisers embraced search advertising," Eric Schmidt, Google’s CEO, said in a prepared statement. "We feel confident about our future, and plan to continue to invest aggressively in our core areas of strategic focus."
Still, the vast majority of Google’s revenue in the quarter — 96% — came from advertising. That has some investors worried that Google will forever remain an advertising company disguised in a tech firm’s clothes. The other 4% of Google’s revenue came mostly from selling Google Apps to corporate customers — a business that’s under pressure from Microsoft after the release of an online version of Office 2010.
Google took a few other hard knocks during the past three months. Users clicked on fewer ads compared to last quarter, and Google’s bottom line was hit hard by an unfavorable foreign exchange rate.
In all, the second quarter produced results that mostly fell short of Wall Street’s expectations. Google said its net income increased to $1.84 billion. Excluding one-time benefits, Google said it earned $6.45 per share. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters, who typically exclude one-time items from their estimates, had forecast earnings of $6.51 per share.
Sales for the Mountain View, Calif., company rose 24% to $6.82 billion. Excluding advertising sales that Google shares with partners, a figure also known as "traffic acquisition costs," the company reported revenue of $5.1 billion, roughly in line with analysts’ forecasts of $5 billion.
Shares of Google (GOOG, Fortune 500) fell 5% after hours. The stock is down more than 20% this year, faring far worse than competitors like Yahoo (YHOO, Fortune 500), Microsoft (MSFT, Fortune 500) and Apple (AAPL, Fortune 500).
The company remained upbeat about its quarter. Google noted that the average per-click rate that it charges advertisers has been rising, helping drive the company’s results higher. The company won regulatory approval for its purchase of mobile advertising company AdMob, and it recently secured its license to continue operating in China.
Google continues to invest in the expansion, adding 1,184 employees during the quarter. On a conference call with investors, Patrick Pichette, Google’s chief financial officer, said now is the "right time" for Google to grow its business, especially because the company is seeing financial growth from its emerging businesses amid a still-difficult economic environment.
"There’s a lot you hear on the news about how the world economy is going to hurt us and all, but from a Google perspective, our business has had a great quarter," said Pichette on the call.
But at the same time, the company deflected an analyst’s question about whether it would start to return some of its $30 billion in cash to shareholders. Pichette said only that the decision is the board’s to make.
The executive who succeeded founder B. Thomas Golisano at Paychex Inc. will exit at the end of this month.
The Rochester-based company announced Monday that Jonathan Judge has resigned as president and chief executive officer, effective July 31. Judge, who joined Paychex in October 2004 as just its second president and CEO, will complete his term as a member of the Paychex board of directors.
Golisano, who owns the Buffalo Sabres, told reporters the resignation by Judge to pursue other interests was straightforward and simple.
“Jon joined Paychex as my successor, bringing with him experience and qualifications gained during his 25-year career with IBM,” said Golisano payday loan lenders. “During his tenure with Paychex, Jon guided our company’s revenue growth from $1.4 billion in fiscal 2005 to $2.0 billion in 2010. He also strengthened our management practices, oversaw key technology advances for our payroll and HR offerings, and led our successful entry into the health and benefits business.”
The Paychex (NASDAQ: PAYX) board immediately began the search for Judge’s successor with an executive committee formed to lead the payroll and benefits company on an interim basis.
Worldwide semiconductor sales were $24.7 billion in May, a sequential increase of 4.5 percent from April when sales were $23.6 billion, and a year-over-year increase of 47.6 percent from the same month last year, the Semiconductor Industry Association said Monday.
“Global sales of semiconductors in May reached a new high and remain on pace to reach the SIA forecast of 28.4 percent growth to $290.5 billion in 2010,” said SIA President George Scalise.
“Chip sales have been buoyed by strength in sales of personal computers, cell phones, corporate information technology, industrial applications, and autos. Unit sales of personal computers are now expected to grow by 20 percent this year and cell phone unit sales are predicted to be up 10 to 12 percent over 2009 levels."
Emerging markets, including China and India, are fueling sales of computation and communications products, Scalise said, and the automotive market is also slowly recovering after several years of weak sales paydayloans. The industry includes some of Austin's largest employers including IBM Corp., Freescale Semiconductor Inc., Advanced Micro Devices Inc., Samsung Austin Semiconductor and others.
SIA noted that the industry year-on-year and sequential growth rates are likely to continue to slow during the second half of 2010.
“Recent chip sales have shown robust demand, but the year-on-year growth rates also underscore the very depressed market conditions of the first half of 2009. Going forward, the year-on-year growth comparisons will reflect the industry recovery that gained momentum in the second half of last year," Scalise said.
After a grueling 20-hour session, lawmakers early Friday finished melding the House and Senate Wall Street reform bills, bringing Congress closer to passing the most sweeping changes to the financial system since the New Deal.
Finishing at 5:39 a.m. ET, 43 lawmakers agreed to send to their respective chambers a final bill that aims to strengthen consumer protection, shine a light on complex financial products, create a new process for taking down giant, failing financial firms, and make them stronger to prevent such failure.
"We are now on the brink of passing Wall Street reform," said President Obama at the White House, shortly before leaving for Canada to attend the G-20 meeting. "We are poised to pass the toughest financial reforms since the ones we passed during the Great Depression."
The conference committee votes were 20-11 among House negotiators and 7-5 among Senate negotiators, strictly along party lines. The room erupted into claps and hugs when it was all done, with staffers shaking hands and saying, "big bill."
In one of their final votes, lawmakers renamed the legislation the Dodd-Frank Bill for the lawmakers who led the work on the reforms: Senate Banking Chairman Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., and House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank, D-Mass. The chamber erupted in cheers on the motion’s approval.
"It’s the most extraordinary experience," Frank said. "You hate to have the kind of pain that so many people went through in this economic crisis, but it just doubled our resolve to get it done."
Frank and Dodd insisted on pushing forward and wrapping up the negotiations, to ready the bill for final passage by each chamber before Congress adjourns for the Independence Day recess.
Shortly after the vote, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner put out a statement supporting the efforts and calling for Congress to move ahead. "We urge Congress to carry the momentum forward and move swiftly towards final passage," he said.
The move was a big win for the White House, giving Obama fodder as he encourages other nations to embrace financial reforms at the G-20 meeting in Toronto on Saturday.
"This will strengthen the hand of the president going to Toronto to make that case," Dodd said. "We can make the case if not to embrace exactly what we’ve done, to embrace the principles we’ve enshrined in this bill."
Despite promises of an open negotiating process, many of the toughest deals were reached in private conversations among Democrats, as well as White House and Treasury officials, outside the Senate meeting room session that was being broadcast on C-SPAN.
Lawmakers, who began negotiations Thursday at 9:30 a.m. ET, grew increasingly short-tempered and weary. Sometimes, the air conditioning shut off, and suit jackets and sweaters came off and sweat ran down faces.
The lawmakers have been meeting for two weeks reconciling the bills, which were largely similar. However, they left most of the toughest decisions to the last day.
Most of Thursday, negotiations were slow going, as Democrats disagreed among themselves on measures that aimed to stop the kinds of problems that lead to the massive taxpayer bailout of American International Group.
Early Friday, lawmakers agreed to a weakened version of a provision originally authored by Sen. Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., to force large banks to spin off divisions that trade derivatives contracts into affiliates.
The compromise allows banks to engage in trades of contracts of traditional banking bets, such as on interest rates and the price of gold. But banks would have to two years to spin off affiliates if they want to make riskier trades, ranging from commodities to credit default swaps.
But Lincoln fought efforts to weaken the provision further Friday morning.
"Clearly swap dealing is a risky activity, and it’s something we need to deal with," Lincoln said. "Banks should be banks."
Finish line
Congress first started working on financial overhaul last spring. The House passed a version in December, and the Senate passed its version in May.
Since January 2009, financial services firms have spent nearly $600 million and hired hundreds of lobbyists to influence legislation including financial reform, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. This week, dozens of them lined the Senate office building meeting room and hallway, where they often pulled staffers and lawmakers aside.
The final compromise that lawmakers struck will establish a consumer financial protection regulatory bureau inside the Federal Reserve, that will write new rules to protect consumers from unfair or abusive mortgages and credit cards. Lawmakers agreed the regulator would not oversee auto dealers who make auto loans.
The final deal will also create a 10-member council of regulators, headed by the Treasury Secretary. The group is tasked with sounding an alarm before companies are in position to trigger a financial crisis.
Regulators will be tasked with ensuring banks beef up their capital cushions, such as forcing financial firms to move more of their assets into investments that are more easily converted into cash over the next several years.
The bill would also establish new procedures for shutting down giant financial firms that are collapsing.
The bill aims to shine a brighter light on some of the different kinds of complex financial products, called derivatives, that are blamed for the problems that forced a bailout of American International Group (AIG, Fortune 500) and the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers. It would force most derivatives on to clearinghouses and exchanges, to help pinpoint the value of the trades.
Republicans objected to some of the bill’s major provisions, particularly parts that establish the consumer agency and create new rules for the derivatives. While they generally favored more consumer protection and more regulation of derivatives, they argued that the legislation is too heavy-handed in these areas.
Late night calls
Derivatives: After midnight, lawmakers began discussing differences on the bills that aim to shine a light on derivatives.
Lawmakers agreed to push many derivatives onto clearinghouses and exchanges that can better pinpoint the value of the securities and create firewall’s between buyers and sellers.
They also agreed to allow leeway for financial firms to avoid exchanges and avoid posting collateral on such contracts for so-called commercial end-users, such as airlines that are trying to hedge against the changing price of jet fuel.
Additionally, lawmakers embraced a provision that prevents big banks from making risky bets on "nontraditional" derivatives and having access to emergency taxpayer-backed loans. Banks would have to spin off their swaps desk into affiliates, if they want to make such bets.
Volcker: Just before midnight, lawmakers agreed on a new version of the so-called Volcker Rule, which was first proposed by former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker. The measure prevents banks from owning hedge funds and trading for their own accounts.
Lawmakers agreed to gives regulators more specifics and less leeway when it comes to preventing banks from trading for themselves or owning hedge funds. But they also watered it down in several ways: It doesn’t impact insurers. And it allows some proprietary trading in areas, such as government debt, for hedging purposes and small business investments.
As for the ban on banks owning hedge funds, the provision allows Wall Street banks that take commercial deposits to sink as much as 3% of capital in hedge funds or private equity.
Consumer groups and policy analysts watching the negotiations noted that 3% of a giant Wall Street bank’s capital means billions could still be invested on risky bets.
"Three percent of Goldman Sachs’ capital is a big number, and it enables very large funds," said Raj Date, executive director of the Cambridge Winter Center for Financial Institutions Policy.
Also, for some banks, the provision may not fully go into effect for up to seven years, according to Jaret Seiberg, an analyst with Concept Capital’s Washington Research Group.
Bank tax: The cost of implementing Wall Street reform bills is around $19 billion and Congress decided to pay for it by taxing the largest financial firms, with firms taking the biggest risks paying the most.
Starbucks Corp. has opened its first store in Hungary.
The Seattle-based coffee giant (NASDAQ: SBUX) created a joint venture with Amrest, a restaurant operator in in Central and Eastern Europe, to manage the store, located in Budapest.
“We have great respect for the longstanding and colorful Hungarian coffeehouse culture and are excited to become a part of the community,” said Vladan Armus, Starbucks Brand President for Central and Eastern Europe, in a statement.
Full Starbucks press release below.
BUDAPEST, Hungary–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Starbucks Coffee has opened its first store in Hungary in the lively and popular WestEnd Mall.
AmRest Kavezo KFT, a joint-venture company between Starbucks Coffee International, Inc. a wholly-owned subsidiary of Starbucks Coffee Company (NASDAQ: SBUX), and AmRest Sp. z o.o., a wholly-owned subsidiary of AmRest Holdings S.E. (AmRest, WSE: EAT), will manage the daily operations.
“We have great respect for the longstanding and colorful Hungarian coffeehouse culture and are excited to become a part of the community,” said Vladan Armus, Starbucks Brand President for Central and Eastern Europe. “Over the past few years, coffeehouses have regained their popularity in Hungary, and we look forward to introducing our customers to our high quality coffees and the unique Starbucks Experience.
“WestEnd Mall is a vibrant and dynamic location in the heart of Budapest where people love to shop and meet,” continued Armus. "We think it will be an ideal location for people to enjoy a place where they can rest, relax and chat with friends over a great cup of coffee.”
Starbucks and AmRest have worked together since 2008 opening stores together in the Czech Republic and Poland. They now operate 16 stores across the three markets.
“We are excited to open our first store in Hungary and are committed to being part of the community, a good neighbor and a force for bringing our partners (employees), customers and their communities together,” said Buck Hendrix, president of Starbucks Europe, Middle East and Africa. “Our expansion into Hungary with our trusted partner AmRest is another positive step forward in growing our presence in markets that have a longstanding coffeehouse tradition throughout Central and Eastern Europe.”
Customers in Budapest will be able to enjoy Starbucks full range of offerings including hot and cold beverages made from 100% Fairtrade certified espresso, brewed coffee, and a full range of Tazo Teas. Starbucks will also offer a selection of 16 different varieties of the world’s finest whole bean arabica coffees sourced from farms across Latin America, Africa and Asia Pacific.
Starbucks will offer traditional coffeehouse fare like cakes, muffins, donuts, sandwiches and salads. Exclusive to Starbucks Hungary will be a selection of local favorites including Reform Triangle Sandwiches, Sausage Sandwiches and Pick Salami Sandwiches. Starbucks Hungary is very proud to feature Cheese Pogácsa and Almond Nougat Cake baked by the treasured local patisserie, Gerbeaud Confectionery.
Since 1971, Starbucks Coffee Company has been committed to ethically sourcing and roasting the highest quality arabica coffee in the world. Today, with stores around the globe, the company is the premier roaster and retailer of specialty coffee in the world. Through our unwavering commitment to excellence and our guiding principles, we bring the unique Starbucks Experience to life for every customer through every cup. To share in the experience, please visit us in our stores or online at www.starbucks.com.
AmRest is the largest independent restaurant operator in Central and Eastern Europe. It manages KFC, Pizza Hut, Burger King, Starbucks, Applebee’s, freshpoint and Rodeo Drive sites in Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Bulgaria, Serbia and Russia. The company will operate Starbucks coffeehouses in Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic. For more information, please visit www.amrest.eu.
The High Point City Council has voted to approve an incentive package for a startup drug company that is considering locating there.
The incentives for Apixir Pharma Sciences would be worth up to $35,000, if the firm does open a facility and meets certain milestones. Officials with the High Point Economic Development Corp. said Apixir plans to create at least 25 local jobs within three years, mostly in scientific and research positions. The average wage would be between $40,000 and $50,000 per year.
The company is considering a location at Premier Office & Technology Park, but is also considering other locations in the Triad and elsewhere, officials said.
This ought to keep the Maytag repairman busy for a while.
The appliance manufacturer along with the Consumer Product Safety Commission on Thursday announced the recall of about 1.7 million dishwashers made by the company between February 2006 and April of 2010.
"An electrical failure in the dishwasher’s heating element can pose a serious fire hazard," said the recall notice issued by the CPSC.
"Maytag has received 12 reports of dishwasher heating element fires that have resulted in fires and dishwasher damage, including one report of extensive kitchen damage from a fire," the CPSC said. There have no reports of injuries.
The recall includes select Maytag, Amana, Jenn-Air, Admiral, Magic Chef, Performa and Crosley brands manufactured by Maytag.
The company has set up a website where customers can check their unit’s serial number to see if it is included in the recall — www.repair.maytag.com. Consumers will be able to choose between having their dishwasher repaired or accepting a rebate toward the purchase of a new dishwasher.
The Maytag repairman has been a staple of the company’s corporate image. Since 1967, Maytag has touted its quality by showing a bored repairman with nothing to do.
BERLIN — A dark cloud has settled over the world’s financial markets, as growing numbers of people conclude that the debt crisis in Europe could hammer global growth — and even bring back recession barely a year after a patchy recovery took hold.
Government officials — whose job it is to boost confidence — downplay that risk, but many economists are warning that a much-feared "double dip" recession could be starting from Europe.
It would be the next ugly chapter in the global financial and economic turmoil that began three years ago. And now as then, what is striking is the inter-connectedness of everything — how near-default in Greece and weeks of dithering in Germany have affected commodities such as oil and gold and, with demand and confidence waning, have bludgeoned stock markets around the world in a way that rattles ordinary people saving for retirement from Korea to California.
In 2007, the bad debt connected to repackaged subprime mortgages started undermining banks and hedge funds, and by early 2008 confidence in the system was slipping fast. This time it is the exposure of banks everywhere to sovereign debt — the IOUs of governments — whose value has been falling for months.
The sheer size of the European economy is a factor, said Mauro F. Guillen, director of the Lauder Institute at The Wharton School in Pennsylvania. "If European demand goes down, global growth will slow down," he said.
"A European economy that lags is not necessarily enough to put the world economy back into recession," Nicholas Colas, ConvergEx Group chief market strategist, said. "But a European economy that cannot stabilize its currency and capital markets certainly will push the global economy back into the red.
"A double dip is a possibility."
It is a daunting prospect, because having already deployed their best countermeasures — stimulus spending and central bank interest rate cuts — governments everywhere may be out of ammunition.
Stephen Lewis, a London-based economist with Monument Securities, spoke for many of the pessimists Friday after a week of market turmoil in Europe when he saw "no guarantee that the upswing in the global economy from 2009’s low point will be sustained."
At the heart of the crisis are fears that indebted eurozone governments will be unable to pay what they owe. Those fears have sent the prices of government bonds — many of them held by big banks in Germany and France — plummeting. Europe also faces low growth prospects because governments must cut back on spending to pay down heavy debt loads payday loan lenders in states.
If banks in Europe and beyond suffer losses on marked-down government bonds, this would then make them afraid to lend the money that businesses need to operate and expand, choking off growth — a replay, in a sense, of the freezing of credit markets after the Sept. 2008 collapse of the U.S. investment bank Lehman Brothers, which led to a worldwide recession. The global economy shrank by 0.6 percent in 2009, its first dip since World War II.
"If sovereign debt concerns are accompanied by worries over bank liquidity any more significant than those currently influencing the credit market, another dip in world economic activity would seem a sure thing," Lewis said.
As fear spreads, stocks and the price of oil, both signs of expectations for future economic growth, have been drawn into the downdraft. And gold, traditionally a safe haven, has hit ominous all-time highs.
Most of the world’s leading stock markets are below where they started the year as investors revise down their growth expectations for the global economy.
Reflecting the optimism that held sway until recently, the IMF slightly raised in April its 2010 global growth forecast to 4.2 percent, although eurozone growth was forecast at only 1 percent. Now even that looks optimistic.
World markets have always affected each other, but instant and constant connectivity and real-time trading and instant information have taken things to a new level; bad news in Milan can trigger instant selloffs in Tokyo or Chicago.
A sell-off in the stock market this week signaled, among other things, a belief that the economy is headed for a slowdown later this year, after having expanded by nearly 12 percent in the first quarter from the same quarter the year before.
Daniel Tarullo, a governor with the U.S. Federal reserve, said the direct effect on U.S. banks of losses on exposure to overextended governments in Greece, Portugal, Spain, Ireland and Italy "would be small." But if problems were to spread more broadly through Europe, U.S. banks would face larger losses as the value of traded assets dropped and loan delinquencies mounted.
Neil Mackinnon, global macro strategist at VTB Capital in London, said it would be a mistake to think the problems on Europe’s periphery represented only a local crisis.
"The problems in the eurozone debt markets, which many people thought was a regional problem, has morphed into a major global problem," Mackinnon said.
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