Business news

Greenspan nears a fifth term

Washington The Senate Banking Committee on Thursday approved President Bush’s nomination of Alan Greenspan to serve a fifth term as chairman of the Federal Reserve.

The approval came on a voice vote with only Sen. Jim Bunning, R-Ky., voting against the nomination.

The banking committee chairman, Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., has said that he plans to move Greenspan’s nomination through the full Senate “as expeditiously as possible” with a vote possible by Friday.

Greenspan, 78, has guided the Fed since 1987 when he was tapped by President Reagan to succeed another legendary chairman, Paul Volcker. He was re-nominated to the Fed post once by Bush’s father and twice by President Clinton.

Pension shortfalls not quite as severe

Washington Underfunded pension plans reported a total shortfall of $278.6 billion in the latest government filings, down from $305.9 billion the previous year.

Airlines and steel companies still are among the industries with the biggest shortfalls. Overall, 1,050 underfunded plans reported $641.8 billion in assets to cover $920.3 billion in retirement benefits and other liabilities, said the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp.

The 2003 reports were due April 15, but only pension plans that were underfunded by more than $50 million were required to file. PBGC by law cannot identify the companies sponsoring the underfunded plans.

At the airlines, 11 companies reported a total deficit of $31 billion in plans covering 444,000 participants. In the steel industry, seven companies had a shortfall of $6 billion in plans covering 213,000 participants.

Since PBGC was created in 1974, the airline and steel sectors have accounted for more than 70 percent of the agency’s claims, though they have just 5 percent of pension plan participants.

CdA Mines asks for shareholder list

Coeur d’Alene Mines Corp., whose merger offer was rebuffed twice by Wheaton Minerals Ltd.’s board of directors, has asked the Canadian company for a shareholder list so it can approach stockholders directly.

Wheaton River has 10 days to provide the list to Coeur d’Alene Mines. The board of directors of the Vancouver, B.C., mining firm also appointed a special committee of three directors to review Coeur’s unsolicited offer of $2 billion in stock and cash, plus an earlier stock bid from Iamgold Corp. of Toronto.

Wheaton River’s management is urging stockholders to accept the Iamgold offer, a combination that would create a new Canadian gold-mining company. Shareholders will vote on the proposal on July 6.

Earlier this month, nearly 80 percent of Wheaton River’s shareholders voted to accept Iamgold’s offer. However, the company scheduled a second vote to give shareholders more time to consider the proposal. The move came after sharp criticism from Coeur d’Alene Mines officials.

Golden Star Resources, of Denver, which is trying to purchase Iamgold, made a similar request for Iamgold’s shareholder list.

The two Canadian companies announced plans to merge this spring, prompting competing offers from Coeur d’Alene Mines and Golden Star Resources.

Mortgage rates take slight jump

Washington Rates on 30-year and 15-year mortgages rose this week, a trend that isn’t expected to clip the wings of the housing market, economists said.

In its weekly nationwide survey of rates, Freddie Mac reported Thursday that rates on benchmark 30-year, fixed-rate mortgages climbed to 6.32 percent for the week ending June 17, up from 6.30 percent last week.

Thirty-year mortgage rates hit a low this year of 5.38 percent the week ending March 18. Since then, they have slowly moved upward.

Rates for 15-year, fixed-rate mortgages also rose this week to 5.70 percent, up from 5.67 percent last week. But rates for one-year adjustable rate mortgages dipped to 4.13 percent, down slightly from 4.14 percent last week.

The recent rise in mortgage rates comes in anticipation that the Federal Reserve will raise a key short-term interest rate for the first time in four years on June 30.

Yahoo customers report problems

San Jose, Calif. Some Yahoo Inc. Web sites and services stumbled for the second time in less than a week Thursday as the Internet giant worked to resolve a hardware problem.

In the latest glitch, users may have experienced a slow response from the company’s servers from about 8 a.m. 11 a.m PDT. Some people also reported that they were unable to log onto Yahoo’s instant messaging program.

The company released a statement describing the problem as an “isolated hardware-related issue.”

It was unrelated to Tuesday’s incident in which Yahoo and several other Web sites were sluggish or entirely inaccessible for two hours.

Grasso seeks move suit to federal court

New York Lawyers for former New York Stock Exchange chief Richard Grasso have filed to move the lawsuit over his compensation brought by state Attorney General Eliot Spitzer from state to federal court.

The filing automatically removes the case from state court, though a spokesman for Spitzer said the attorney general would contest the removal in federal court by early next week.

Their next court date will likely be a hearing before a federal judge on whether the case should remain in U.S. District Court or be sent back to state court.

Grasso spokesman Eric Starkman noted that the move to federal court was a “technical legal matter” and did not constitute Grasso’s official response to Spitzer’s lawsuit, filed May 24. Grasso has 30 days from the date of Spitzer’s suit to file a response.

Spitzer is seeking the return of the bulk of Grasso’s $187.5 million compensation package, awarded in August 2003, claiming that the former NYSE head misled the board of directors about his pay and bullied them into approving his compensation. Revelations about the lawsuit prompted Grasso’s resignation as chairman and chief executive of the NYSE in September.