Print

Email story

Comment

Email editor

Digest

Wal-Mart appliances prices cut

By TIMES WIRES
Published November 11, 2006

Wal-Mart shoppers got another early Christmas present on Friday when the world's largest retailer cut prices on appliances a week after slashing them on electronics and before that, toys. On Friday, Wal-Mart announced discounts ranging from around 7 percent to 17 percent on roughly 50 small home appliances, including GE microwaves and programmable coffee makers. The prices are effective immediately through Christmas, a company spokeswoman said.

Russia closer to WTO membership

A longtime economic goal of Russia - entry into the World Trade Organization - moved a crucial step forward Friday as U.S. and Russian trade negotiators reached agreement. Terms of the U.S.-Russia agreement weren't released. In theory, freer trade would give Russian companies more opportunities to sell their goods on world markets, and would open its market to more outsiders.

Intel's Vietnam investment grows

Intel Corp., the world's largest computer chipmaker, announced Friday it will more than triple its initial investment in Vietnam to $1-billion, dramatically expanding the size of a chip assembly and testing plant it is building in the country's southern business hub. Construction is expected to begin in March. It will be Vietnam's first semiconductor facility, and Intel's sixth testing facility in Asia.

Fastow to do time in Louisiana prison

Former Enron Corp. financial whiz Andrew Fastow will serve six years in a federal prison in Louisiana for plundering the company while concealing its feeble financial condition from investors. According to a posting Friday on the Web site for the U.S. Bureau of Prisons, which decides where inmates are sent, Fastow was assigned to the Federal Detention Center in Oakdale, La., about 200 miles northeast of Houston.

Officials ask 3-year term for U.S. exec

Prosecutors on Friday demanded a three-year prison term for the American executive of a mining company accused of dumping waste with dangerous levels of mercury and arsenic into an Indonesian bay. Prosecutors could have requested a 10-year sentence for Richard Ness, 56, who heads the Denver-based Newmont Mining Corp.'s local subsidiary, Minahasa Raya. .

Ex-HP ethics chief pleads innocent

Kevin Hunsaker, former ethics chief for Hewlett-Packard Co., has pleaded not guilty to four felony charges for allegedly directing the computer and printer maker's ill-fated boardroom spying probe, authorities said this week. Hunsaker is one of five people scheduled to appear in court on Nov. 17.

[Last modified November 11, 2006, 01:09:43]