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Florida and Fortune 500 are phrases rarely uttered in the same breath. Florida may be the fourth-largest state in population, but this year it is home to only 11 public companies super-sized enough to qualify for membership on the list of the 500 biggest U.S. corporations.
Just two of these 11 are in the Tampa Bay area. By coincidence, these two suffered the greatest sales declines last year among the Florida 11.
The bad news this year? Thanks to the weak economy, the combined revenues of all Fortune 500 companies slid for only the sixth time in the list's 49-year history, down 6 percent to $6.95-trillion. The not-so-bad news? While some big Florida companies saw their revenues dip a bit, more businesses enjoyed gains.
Five of the 11 suffered shrinking revenues. The sharpest decline among Florida Fortune 500 companies last year was St. Petersburg electronic manufacturer Jabil Circuit, whose revenues fell 18 percent. The others with lower revenues include: Clearwater's Tech Data Corp., this area's largest company by sales, down 8.5 percent; Miami's Ryder System, down 4.6 percent; Fort Lauderdale's AutoNation, the country's largest retailer of cars and trucks, down 2.6 percent; and Juno Beach's FPL Group (parent of Miami's Florida Power & Light), down 2.3 percent.
Six of the 11 Fortune 500 members from Florida enjoyed increases in revenues last year. Tops in gains was Miami homebuilder Lennar Corp, up a striking 21.4 percent. Then came Orlando's Darden Restaurants (owner of Red Lobster and Olive Garden chains), up 8.6 percent; Lakeland's Publix Super Markets, up 4.2 percent; Delray Beach's Office Depot, up 2.5 percent; Orlando wholesale distributor Hughes Supply, a gain of 0.9 percent; and Jacksonville's Winn-Dixie, up 0.3 percent.
Given the economy, that's not a bad performance - certainly better than the country as a whole.
Maybe that bullishness is one reason 90 percent of Florida chief executives surveyed after the start of the Iraq war offered strong support for the U.S. military effort in a national poll of top managers unveiled this week. Most CEOs responded that they thought the war would continue for two to three months, that their businesses would operate as usual, and they expected a U.S. economic rebound in the third quarter.
Of 85 Florida CEOs questioned, 42 percent said the war in Iraq would reduce nervousness over world events that's lingered since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. The survey polled members of the Executive Committee, an international organization of 500 chief executives. Florida executives were slightly more upbeat than those elsewhere in the nation. That optimism is a long and consistent theme in Florida business circles.
In January, I noted that stock promoter Allen Z. Wolfson was back in the spotlight. The 1964 Boca Ciega High School graduate turned real estate developer was convicted more than 20 years ago of defrauding Tampa's Metropolitan Bank and Trust Co., a now-failed institution chaired at the time by Dick Greco, Tampa's newly retired mayor.
Wolfson later relocated to Salt Lake City and renewed his penny stock financing career. He apparently masterminded a major "pump and dump" stock scheme involving shares in six small companies. Last month, a federal jury in New York City found Wolfson guilty of one count of conspiracy to commit securities fraud, wire fraud and commercial bribery, five counts of securities fraud and one count of wire fraud. Under federal sentencing guidelines, Wolfson could face as many as 19 years in prison.
Given Florida's allure as an international tourist magnet, can the arrival of SARS throughout the state be far behind?
Florida identified a 21-year-old woman and 36-year-old man as its first two suspected casesof Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome this week. Many large companies have banned or limited travel to Asian countries, according to a survey by the Business Travel Coalition. In Fort Myers, the News-Press reports that local businessman Wen Jong Wu was scheduled to go to China on April 11 to finalize designs for his company's 2004 line of wedding and formal dresses. Now he will wait until the SARS scare eases.
Not that SARS is Florida tourism's biggest worry in this slack and travel-wary economy.
Like Wu, other business travelers are delaying Asian trips, newspapers report this week. Houston bank president David Tai planned to travel to Asia recently, but canceled the trip because of SARS. At Stone Mountain outside of Atlanta, gift shop partner Adrienne Boyer canceled plans last week to go to Hong Kong and southern China, where she was to finalize the fall line of ceramic piggy banks, decorative teapots, picture frames and other gifts.
There's a real war in Iraq. But Casselberry, a town of 25,000 near Orlando, is waging its own modest conflict against a powerful opponent. Casselberry is one of a handful of towns whose 30-year electricity contracts have expired with area utility giant Progress Energy Florida (the new name of Florida Power Corp).
Casselberry didn't like it when the power company left out a traditional buyout option for the city in its renewal agreement. Now Casselberry may try to buy out Progress Energy Florida's operations in the city and run its own power service.
Not if Progress Energy can help it. The battle of words and legal maneuvers escalated anew Thursday when Progress Energy said it asked federal regulators for permission to recover $10.6-million in "stranded costs" from Casselberry - if the city moves forward with its local takeover of the company's electric distribution system. No city in Florida has taken over an electric distribution system since 1943, Progress Energy likes to point out.
Tom Cloud, an Orlando attorney who is fighting Progress Energy on behalf of several central Florida towns, argues the company is not entitled to a dime of stranded costs. "It's just an anti-competitive attempt to blackmail the cities into signing whatever franchise Progress Energy puts in front of them," he said Thursday in an exchange of e-mails.
At this rate, the Iraq war may be resolved before this local confrontation. This spat over electricity gives new meaning to "shock and awe."
- Robert Trigaux can be reached at trigaux@sptimes.com or (727) 893-8405.