Business: Business digest

MORE DIFFICULTIES FOR ADELPHIA: Adelphia Communications, under investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission and two federal grand juries, apparently over-reported its cable television subscribers by 358,000 by including all the customers in joint ventures it owns only portions of, an analyst said. USB Warburg analyst Aryeh Bourkoff warned of "the very high likelihood of a near-term bankruptcy filing" by Adelphia. An Adelphia spokesman would not comment on the report. In other news, Charter Communications said it ended talks to buy cable systems from Adelphia.

STEWART INVOLVED IN INQUIRY: A U.S. House panel is reviewing whether Martha Stewart and other friends and family of former ImClone Systems Inc. chief executive Samuel Waksal sold shares shortly before U.S. regulators rejected the biotechnology company's application for a cancer drug. ImClone shares have dropped 87 percent since the Food and Drug Administration rejected ImClone's filing. Stewart sold all her stock a day or two before ImClone announced the unfavorable ruling, the New York Times reported. A spokeswoman for Stewart said Stewart did not receive any non-public information regarding ImClone.

ENRON BOARD RESIGNATIONS: Four Enron board members resigned Thursday, the last of the directors to have served before the company began its slide into bankruptcy. Wendy Gramm -- wife of Texas Sen. Phil Gramm -- Herbert Winokur, Norman P. Blake Jr. and Bob Belfer have stepped down.

INVENTORIES SLIDE IN APRIL: Inventories at U.S. wholesalers unexpectedly fell during April as sales rose at the fastest pace in three years. Wholesalers held $281.8-billion worth of merchandise during the month, the lowest since October 1999 and down 0.7 percent from March, the Commerce Department said. Combined sales by distributors of everything from automobiles to clothing and chemicals rose 1.6 percent, the biggest jump since May 1999. That pushed down the inventory-sales ratio, a measure of how long goods remain unsold, to 1.23 months in April, the lowest in a decade of comparable records.

PEPSICO PICKS TROPICANA CHIEF: PepsiCo Inc. has named Jim Dwyer to be head of its Tropicana juice business. Dwyer, 43, helped the company integrate Quaker Oats Co., which PepsiCo bought in August 2001. Separately, PepsiCo named Dawn Hudson president of the company's North American soft-drink operations. Hudson, 44, was senior vice president of strategy and marketing for brands including Mountain Dew soda and Aquafina water at the Pepsi-Cola North America unit.

ANDERSEN DELIBERATIONS: Jurors in Arthur Andersen LLP's obstruction of justice trial deliberated for a second day without reaching a verdict. The jury spent about an hour listening to a court reporter read back testimony from David Duncan, the accounting firm's former top Enron Corp. auditor, regarding his guilty plea to the same charge. The jury had asked Thursday for an entire transcript of Duncan's testimony, but U.S. District Judge Melinda Harmon denied the request and said they could have portions read back to them. Harmon said jurors would resume deliberating today.

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