Briefcase
Wages may be issue in pilot shortage
The nation’s regional airlines are having trouble hiring enough pilots, the government says, suggesting one reason may be that they simply don’t pay enough.
A pool of qualified pilots is available, but it’s unclear whether they are willing to work for low entry-level wages, the Government Accountability Office said in a report released Friday.
The U.S. airline industry will need to hire 1,900 to 4,500 new pilots annually over the next 10 years due to an expected surge in retirements of pilots reaching age 65 and increased demand for air travel, according to the report.
Citigroup lowers profit, citing fraud in Mexico
NEW YORK – Citigroup said a fraud at its Mexican banking unit will slice $235 million from last year’s net income.
The bank said on Friday that Mexican oil services company Oceanografia SA de CV apparently submitted falsified invoices to get loans it wasn’t entitled to. The invoices were supposed to back $585 million in loans, but Citi could only verify the backing for $185 million.
Citi’s large Mexican bank, Banco Nacional de Mexico, had been lending money to OSA to cover work that OSA was doing for Mexico’s state-owned oil company, Petroleos Mexicanos.
Citi said it learned of the problem Feb. 11 after OSA was suspended from getting more Mexican government contracts
GrubHub orders up $100 million IPO
CHICAGO – Online delivery company GrubHub plans to raise up to $100 million through an initial public offering.
The Chicago company, formerly known as GrubHub Seamless Inc., connects more than 28,000 restaurants with diners in more than 600 U.S. cities. It had 3.4 million active diners at the end of 2013.
Companies like GrubHub contract with restaurants, mostly in metropolitan areas, and allow customers to shop online by food type, cuisine or restaurant name to find what they want and have it delivered or prepared before pickup.
The company did not disclose how many shares would be offered in the IPO or the projected price range in a regulatory filing Friday.
Mattel makes offer for Mega Brands
TORONTO – Mattel Inc. has made a friendly takeover offer for Canadian toy maker Mega Brands Inc., which has the world’s No. 2 line of construction sets after Lego.
The deal values the Montreal-based company at $460 million, including debt that the American industry giant will assume or repay.
Mattel manufactures Barbie dolls and Hot Wheels cars among numerous other toys. The company says Mega Brands will help it expand in two of the fastest-growing product segments: construction sets, and arts and crafts.
Casino company says customer data stolen
LAS VEGAS – Computer hackers stole some Las Vegas Sands customers’ Social Security and driver’s license numbers during a data breach earlier this month, the casino company said Friday.
Las Vegas Sands Corp. said in a statement that the information about some patrons at its Bethlehem, Pa., hotel-casino was compromised during the Feb. 10 attack. It was unclear whether credit card information was also taken.
Sands said it was still working to determine whether customer information from other properties was breached. The company runs the Italian-themed Venetian and Palazzo on the Las Vegas Strip, and several hotel-casinos in China and Singapore.