Weather | Sports | Forums | Comics | Classifieds | Calendar | Movies
MARKETS CLIMB ON FORECASTS: Investors could thank Wall Street's analysts for much of the stock market's rally Monday, which gave the Dow Jones Industrial Average its fourth triple-digit gain in just over two weeks. Thomson First Call reiterated its forecast that first-quarter profits will be 20 percent better than in the same quarter a year ago for companies in the Standard & Poor's 500-stock index. The Dow closed Monday at 10,329.63 with a gain of 116.66 points, or 1.1 percent. The S&P 500 rose 14.41 points, or 1.3 percent, to 1,122.47, and the Nasdaq composite added 32.55 points, or 1.7 percent, to 1,992.57.
HOLLYWOOD VIDEO ACCEPTS OFFER: Hollywood Entertainment Corp., which operates 18 Hollywood Video stores in the Tampa Bay area, said Monday that it agreed to be sold for $840-million and assumption of $300-million in debt to a private equity group led by Leonard Green & Partners, a Los Angeles buyout firm. The price is $14 in cash for each share of Hollywood Entertainment, which closed Monday up 28 percent at $13.66. Hollywood Entertainment founder and CEO Mark Wattles will get half the stock in the surviving company, based in Wilsonville, Ore.
KFORCE STILL TALKING MERGER: Tampa staffing company Kforce Inc.'s tenuous plan to acquire competitor Hall Kinion & Associates Inc. of Novato, Calif., may still happen. "We are in continuing conversations with them, and we certainly hope that the merger does proceed," Kforce chief marketing officer Ken Pierce said Monday. Also Monday, Hall Kinion said in a regulatory filing that it paid of $200,000 to its CEO and chairman this month to write letters of credit worth $5-million. The company used the letters to obtain an additional $5-million on a line of credit.
SEC INVESTIGATES TYSON FOODS: Tyson Foods Inc., the world's largest meat producer, said Monday the Securities and Exchange Commission were conducting a formal investigation of benefits received by some board members and company officers, including former senior chairman Don Tyson and current chairman and CEO John Tyson. Tyson Foods said it was fully cooperating with the SEC.
XBOX PRICE DROPS $30: Microsoft Corp. is hoping to draw a broader audience to its Xbox game console - and away from rival Sony's PlayStation 2 - by cutting its price by $30. The company said Monday it would begin selling its Xbox for $149.99 today in the United States. Microsoft also said it was dropping prices on several games and its Xbox Music Mixer software, which turns an Xbox into a karaoke machine. Teresa Weaver, a spokeswoman for Sony Computer Entertainment America, said Sony has not announced any price reduction plans for PlayStation 2, which sells for about $180.
FRANCE INVESTIGATES VIVENDI EXECS: French prosecutors have begun legal action against two employees of Vivendi Universal SA and an unnamed banker in connection with alleged manipulation of the media and communications giant's share price, the Associated Press said Monday, citing court officials who spoke on condition of anonymity. Vivendi treasurer Hubert Dupont-Lothelain and an assistant, Francois Blondet, were placed under formal investigation - one step short of being charged. The two are accused of arranging for the company to buy back shares above authorized volumes in September and October 2001 in an effort to boost market price. Vivendi declined comment Monday.
T-BILL RATES MIXED: The Treasury Department sold $18-billion in three-month securities at a discount rate of 0.945 percent, up from 0.930 percent last week. An additional $15-billion was sold in six-month bills at a rate of 0.990 percent, unchanged from the week before. The Federal Reserve said the average yield for one-year constant maturity Treasury bills dipped to 1.17 percent last week from 1.18 percent the previous week.