The Times of Trenton Business News

Local NJ business news and economics

• Sliding backward
Dear Biz Brain:

• Sliding backward: Lehman's CEO answers to Congress and testifies he made $350M in 7 years
WASHINGTON -- The now-bankrupt investment bank Lehman Brothers arranged millions in bonuses for fired executives as it pleaded for a federal lifeline, lawmakers learned yesterday, as Congress began investigating what went so wrong on Wall Street to prompt a $700 billion government bailout.

• Sliding backward: In Trenton, 10 Assembly meetings, one focus: Jersey's recovery during economic downturn
One Assembly committee approved legislation to help homeowners facing foreclosure. Others held hearings on state regulation of financial institutions, the prospects for creating new jobs and how hard times are straining social service agencies.

• Demand for commodities tumbles
Just a few months ago, soaring prices for everything from corn to crude oil seemed ready to ignite a flood of global inflation.

• Oil drops below $90 amid sliding economy
NEW YORK -- Oil prices plunged below $90 a barrel yesterday, coming within reach of year-ago levels as a widening financial maelstrom spreads overseas and crimps global demand for energy.

• Bank of America's profit plummets 68% in Q3
NEW YORK -- Bank of America yesterday reported its third-quarter results earlier than planned, revealing a 68 percent profit drop and plans to boost capital by selling stock and halving its dividend.

• Law firm gives old store new look
When Garces and Grabler initially took over a run-down storefront with plans to make it into a law office, Mayor Douglas Palmer saw the site looking worse, not better.

• New era as ImClone soap opera ends
Bristol-Myers Squibb dug in its heels yesterday for a fight over the rights to ImClone Systems' most anticipated new cancer drug after the biotechnology company agreed to be acquired by Eli Lilly & Co.

• Citigroup sues Wachovia, Wells Fargo
NEW YORK -- Citigroup said yesterday it has filed a complaint in New York Supreme Court against Wachovia, Wells Fargo and the directors of both companies seeking more than $60 billion in damages for interfering with the bank's planned takeover of Wachovia's banking operations.

• Fed, Treasury move quickly to carry out rescue plan
WASHINGTON -- The Treasury Department moved swiftly yesterday to implement the financial rescue package, naming a former Goldman Sachs executive to oversee spending the $700 billion earmarked for the plan and pledging to work with other countries to calm global financial markets.

• Marriot hotel to team on two big events
TRENTON -- The Trenton Marriott has placed two feathers in its cap.

• ETS honored by Princeton chamber
PLAINSBORO -- Twenty years ago, Lawrence-based Educational Testing Service spent much of its time helping universities select the most promising student applicants through its Scholastic Achievement Test.

• Worries prevail on Street
Pessimism about a protracted economic downturn washed over the financial markets yesterday, sending stocks plunging and further tightening the credit markets. Reports on declining factory orders and a seven-year high in jobless claims stoked fears the government's financial rescue plan won't ward off a recession, and the Dow Jones industrials skidded nearly 350 points.

• Strong breeze ahead
With two neighboring states having recently approved massive offshore wind farm projects, the Corzine administration is considering expanding New Jersey's future reliance on wind power as a clean source of energy.

• Promote wisely on Facebook
Facebook may be all about staying in touch with your friends, but it's also gaining attention as a tool to enlist those friends for self-promotion and marketing.

• Depression is history lesson unlikely to repeat
They are the stories we heard from our grandparents, the pictures we studied in history books -- bread lines stretching around street corners, shantytowns sheltering the unemployed, small-town banks with darkened windows.

• Senator's slip costs insurers plenty
SAN FRANCISCO -- Insurers' shares tumbled yesterday after Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said a well-known company in the sector was close to bankruptcy.

• Former owner wants Tropicana back
The former owner of the Tropi cana casino says the Atlantic City resort is worth no less than $950 million, and the company will try to regain control of it next week.

• Business Briefs
PENNINGTON -- Ocean Power Technologies, which generates power from ocean waves and specially made buoys, has received a $2 million award from the Department of Energy toward a project off the coast of Reedsport, Ore.

• Ask the Biz Brain
My computer has gotten slower and slower at doing basic things such as booting up and running multiple programs at once. How do I improve its performance without spending any money?

• Integra makes in-kind donation
PLAINSBORO -- Integra LifeSciences Holdings reported it will make an in-kind donation of more than $700,000 worth of neurosurgi cal medical devices to the Boston University School of Medicine, which will be used to provide medical assistance in Armenia.

• Google's online map aims to make mass transit simpler, sometimes
Having to find your way by mass transit on an unfamiliar route can be a frustrating experience.

• -777
For gamblers, 777 means hitting the jackpot.

• -777: Is Wall St.'s mad
It doesn't get much uglier for investors than yesterday.

• -777: Local banks thriving amid the chaos
The financial services industry is reeling from failures, forced mergers and the stunning defeat of the $700 billion congressional rescue bill, but it's business as usual at Hudson City Bancorp in Paramus, which expects to report its best-ever year for deposit growth in 2008.

• -777: Weighing the time
Well, that certainly was unset tling.

• Analysts: Auto loans need to come soon
DETROIT -- If credit remains locked up and auto sales continue to slump, the federal government's $25 billion loan package for the auto industry could be a huge help in keeping Detroit's downtrodden automakers afloat, according to lawmakers and industry analysts.

• Investors take cover in Treasury bills
The credit markets were thrown into further turmoil yesterday after the House rejected the government's proposed financial bailout plan, sending investors swarming again for the safety of Treasury bills.

• -777: N.J. brokers and advisers play operator, answering calls of distressed investors
At Buckman, Buckman & Reid, a stock brokerage in Shrewsbury, the phone started ringing yesterday morning when news hit that Citigroup would acquire Wachovia. But the calls reached a fever pitch around 3 p.m., when Congress' defeat of the bailout package started to sink in.

• What we can learn from the decline of America's easy-credit empire
The meltdown on Wall Street continued to hammer world markets last week as Congress and the Bush administration struggled to reach a deal on a $700 billion rescue package aimed at averting the collapse of the U.S. financial system.

• A time of high anxiety
Steven Levine can't seem to escape the worry. The personal-fi nance specialist's phone is ringing constantly, and even his paddle- ball-playing buddies are pounding him for advice and reassurance about what to do with their money.

• Diversifying investments a critical survival tactic
Investors often buy bonds so they can sleep at night because they are perceived to be less risky than stocks.

• Time to get fluent in the language of government finance
Time to dust off that "corporate finance" textbook from college. Our leaders, it appears, could use our help.

• Couple can benefit from more tax savings
Dane and Cheri are worried about the future. Dane, 43 and self-employed, doesn't have a 401(k) plan, but uses a SEP-IRA instead. They want to make sure they're doing the best they can on their own.

• Sweep keeps
chimneys neat Santa Claus may have glorified the chimney with tales of his furtive creepings up and down its hollowed walls, but for David Eakin, who cleans them, chimneys represent dirty work.

• The state of job security
The year-old financial crisis that brought Wall Street to its knees this month has inflicted relatively little pain on Main Street -- until now.

• Bailout deal lifts markets
Financial markets grew more upbeat yesterday as political leaders said they struck an agreement in principle on a massive spending plan to revive the crippled financial system. The Dow Jones industrial average jumped about 200 points on optimism about the bailout, and demand for safe-haven assets remained high but eased slightly as some investors placed bets that a deal would help unclog credit markets.

• Housing slump deepens
New home sales fell to a 17-year low last month, and durable goods orders dropped more than forecast, evidence of the mounting risks to the economy Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke has warned of.

• Biz Buzz: Ignorance isn't bliss in a tech world
Technology can be a funny thing, especially if you're the person at the help desk.

• Loan and lease unit dims GE earnings
HARTFORD, Conn. -- General Electric, the industrial powerhouse that makes everything from jet engines to light bulbs, cut its earnings forecast for the year yesterday, blaming volatile financial markets that have damaged the profitability of its loan and lease business, which accounts for almost half its income.

• Drugmaker offers $70M to buy biotech
Ligand Pharmaceuticals said it planned to acquire New Jersey biotechnology drugmaker Pharmacopeia for up to $70 million in a stock transaction.

• Program helps kids learn the law
Students at a Newark school can now learn about life at a law firm -- and in the process earn enough to cover part of their tuition.

• Merger of Delta, Northwest gets OK from shareholders
Delta Air Lines and Northwest Airlines shareholders gave the go-ahead yesterday to a merger that would create the world's biggest carrier, deciding that in their volatile industry they like their chances better together than on their own.

• Bank of Princeton names new CEO
PRINCETON BOROUGH -- The Bank of Princeton, which was founded about 15 months ago, has named veteran banking executive Martin Melilli president, replacing initial president and chief executive Peter Crowley. Chairman Stephen Distler will become the new CEO.

• Rutgers center invests in entrepreneurs' plans
A new center on Rutgers University's Newark campus will provide seed capital to entrepreneurs who launch businesses aimed at making the 30,000-student campus into a magnet for the arts, dining, entertainment and retail.

• Pharmacopeia to be acquired by Ligand
SOUTH BRUNSWICK -- Pharmacopeia, a drug-development company based here that has been shedding jobs the past year, has agreed to be acquired by a San Diego-based company, Ligand Pharmaceuticals, in a stock-exchange deal valued at up to $70 million.

• Changes urged for big bailout
Instead of bailing out Wall Street, the federal government ought to throw a line to homeown ers facing foreclosure Allow financial firms to raise the book value of their toxic mortgage securities, so these securities can't threaten the firm's solvency. Loosen the capital rules for institutions whose financial base is being eroded by the dwindling value of the mortgage se curities on their books.

• A refinery redefined
For those who lament the demise of American manufacturing, Innovation Fuels offers a glimmer of optimism.

• Owner looking to block Trop sale
The owner of the Tropicana is threatening to block the sale of the casino by the state, saying a $700 million price is too low.

• Biz Buzz: Bring Palin home without that pesky $1,000-a-plate appearance fee
Tina Fey, eat your heart out.

• Markets end mixed on uncertainty
Tension grew in the financial markets yesterday, sending stocks mostly lower as investors worried about the effectiveness of a still-emerging government plan to rescue banks from crippling debt. The credit markets also showed added strain, with rising demand for short-term Treasury bills, considered the safest of investments.

• Northeast home sales and prices drop
Existing home sales in the Northeast tumbled nearly 19 percent in August from last year, while the median sales price in the region fell 3.8 percent, to $271,000, the National Association of Realtors said yesterday.

• Chamber discusses eco-friendly steps
PLAINSBORO -- Grass-roots environmentalism is fine, but for a true "green" economy to take hold, it must start at the top.

• Living in a slump
WASHINGTON -- Nationwide home prices in July fell a record 5.3 percent, compared with a year ago, a government agency said yesterday, and have now receded to October 2005 levels.

• Tropicana and suitor starting fresh round of negotiations
State officials are hoping the second time will be the charm in their quest to sell the beleaguered Tropicana casino.

• Bristol, ImClone both not budging
Bristol-Myers Squibb's latest offer for biotechology drugmaker ImClone Systems is probably still not enough to turn the tables on corporate raider Carl Icahn, Wall Street analysts said yesterday.

• Credit markets ease slightly on bailout plans
NEW YORK -- The credit markets remained tense yesterday, with the strain showing in both short- and long-term maturities as Wall Street waited for Washington to solidify its plans for a $700 billion bailout of the nation's banks.

• Ask the Biz Brain
My aunt, an 80-year-old widow, gets about $38,000 a year in retirement and Social Security benefits. Her expenses are about $40,000 a year. She has $1.4 million in vested with Morgan Stanley and $600,000 with UBS. Both firms have about 80 percent of her assets in stocks, with annual fees run ning about 1.5 percent. Both brokerage firms have lost close to $60,000 each during the 2008 year. Are they overly risking her as sets? Wouldn't the interest on a 4 percent CD plus her retirement income generate more than enough income?

• Paralegal pleads guilty in NJ Affordable fraud
A paralegal who worked for a Cranford attorney pleaded guilty to criminal charges in federal court yesterday, the latest person to acknowledge her participation in an $80 million real estate fraud authorities say was carried out through NJ Affordable Homes.

• Lilly says it will reveal doctor compensation
WASHINGTON -- In an indus try first, Eli Lilly says it will begin disclosing how much money it paid to individual doctors for advice, speeches and other services.