Business: Business digest

TREASURY AUCTION: Interest rates on short-term Treasury securities were mixed in Wednesday's auction. The Treasury Department sold $14-billion in three-month bills at a discount rate of 1.72 percent, down from 1.73 percent last week. An additional $15-billion was sold in six-month bills at a rate of 1.85 percent, up from 1.84 percent. The new discount rates understate the actual return to investors: 1.752 percent for three-month bills and 1.893 percent for a six-month bill. In a separate report, the Federal Reserve said that the average yield for one-year constant maturity Treasury bills rose to 2.23 percent last week from 2.17 percent the previous week.

IMSG SELLS UNIT: Shareholders of Insurance Management Solutions Group Inc., approved the sale of the company's flood zone mapping business back to its original owners during a special meeting Wednesday. The deal, announced in September, involved the transfer of the GeoTrac mapping business to Daniel and Sandra White for $19-million in cash. The Whites, who had sold the business to IMSG in 1998, also returned 524,000 shares of IMSG common stock they received during the transaction three years ago. Under terms of the sale the Whites agreed to provide flood zone determination services to IMSG for 10 years at favorable prices. IMSG has struggled to carve out a niche as an insurance outsourcing business since it was spun off from Bankers Insurance of St. Petersburg in 1999.

APPLE FORECASTS STORE LOSS: Apple Computer Inc. forecast a fiscal-year 2002 loss from its retail-store operations because of the declining economy and effects of the September terrorist attacks. Apple opened 27 stores this year, two more than originally planned, including a store in Tampa's International Plaza in September. The computer manufacturer said earlier that its retail operations would have a loss for the first quarter ending next week and become profitable for the year ending in September 2002. Brett Miller, an analyst with A.G. Edwards, estimates that the company needs annual sales of $10-million at each store to break even. Apple's shares rose 13 cents to $21.49 and have gained 44 percent this year. Separately, Apple said in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing that chief executive Steve Jobs was paid $1 in annual salary, as he has for the past two years. Jobs also received a $43.5-million private jet and $40.5-million to cover taxes for the plane, a special bonus which was announced in January 2000.

MSN SALES GROW: Microsoft Corp. estimated that retail sales on its MSN network of Web sites reached $5.6-billion during November and December, a 56 percent increase over the same period last year. MSN, the No. 2 U.S. Internet-access provider, saw visitors to the eShop portion of the network more than double between Thanksgiving and Christmas, a spokeswoman said. Microsoft provided rebates of as much as $100 and gave away its Xbox game console as inducements to shop on MSN. Overall Internet sales last week rose by 48 percent to $1.39-billion, according to BizRate.com Inc., which tracks transactions at 2,000 online merchants. Microsoft shares rose 41 cents to $67.68.

ARBITRATION AWARD CALLED A VICTORY: A record $429-million arbitration award against a stock broker for embezzlement and fraud will likely never be fully collected, but the lawyer who represented investors in the dispute said the decision is still a victory. "I expect to get a small amount of money, but we're not going to collect the $429-million. He doesn't have that kind of money," Thomas R. Ajamie said of the broker, Enrique Ernesto Perusquia. A New York Stock Exchange arbitration panel last month ordered the $429-million award after finding that Perusquia had committed "fraud, forgery, breach of fiduciary duty, embezzlement, self-dealing, and other heinous acts" with "willful, wanton and gross disregard" for his clients. The investors alleged that Perusquia had used their accounts to purchase worthless stock in return for kickbacks in the mid-1990s. They claimed he covered up his actions with false account statements. Perusquia, who lives in Jackson Hole, Wyo., has an unlisted phone number and could not be reached for comment.

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