Financial life in a big town

Asian stocks fell Wednesday after the U.S. lowered its economic growth estimate for the third quarter and climbing yields on Spanish bonds magnified worries over Europe’s debt load.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 2 percent to 17,882.10. South Korea’s Kospi lost 2 percent to 1,789.83 and Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 shed 1.6 percent to 4,066.80. Japanese stock markets were closed for a public holiday.

Wall Street slipped Tuesday after a government report showed the U.S. economy grew at a 2 percent annual rate from July through September, down from an initial estimate of 2.5 percent. Economists had expected the figure to remain the same.

The Dow Jones industrial average lost 0.5 percent to close at 11,493.72. The Standard & Poor’s 500 fell 0.4 percent to 1,188.04. The Nasdaq composite fell 0.1 percent to 2,521.28.

Higher borrowing costs for Spain, meanwhile, renewed worries about Europe’s debt crisis. The higher rates suggest that investors are still skeptical that the country will get its budget under control despite a new government coming to power this week.

Investors have been worried that Spain could become the next country to need financial support from its European neighbors if its borrowing rates climb to unsustainable levels.

Greece was forced to seek relief from its lenders after its long-term borrowing rates rose above 7 percent. The rate on Spain’s own benchmark 10-year bond is dangerously close to that level, 6.58 percent payday advance lenders.

Underscoring jitters was the lack of market reaction to an announcement by the International Monetary Fund that it will provide quick cash on flexible terms to countries facing sudden financial stress.

“Failure of this news to result in significant gains across markets shows just how cautious investors are,” Stan Shamu of IG Markets in Melbourne said in a report.

Concerns remain that Europe’s debt crisis is pushing the region toward recession, which would slow industrial activity in countries around the world that export to Europe.

Australian resource shares took a big hit after the country’s House of Representatives approved a proposal to impose a windfall profits tax on big mining companies. The Senate is expected to endorse the measure in early 2012.

BHP Billiton, the world’s largest mining company, fell 2.6 percent. Rival Rio Tinto lost 1.6 percent and Energy Resources of Australia slid 4.2 percent.

Benchmark oil for January delivery was down 65 cents to $97.36 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract rose $1.09 to finish at $98.01 per barrel on the Nymex on Tuesday.

In currencies, the euro fell to $1.3466 from $1.3509 late Tuesday in New York. The dollar rose slightly to 76.99 yen from 76.97 yen.

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Umberto Bossi, the longtime ally of former Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi, says his Northern League party won’t back any government led by economist Mario Monti “for now.”

Bossi says he told Italy’s president that his party will be a “vigilant” opposition to any Monti government until the economist spells out his program to rescue Italy’s troubled economy.

Berlusconi resigned Saturday after Italy came under enormous pressure for its sovereign debt.

Bossi says “for now, we said no online pay day loans.” He adds when Monti reveals his policies, the League will decide on a measure-by-measure basis.

Italy’s president could ask Monti to try to form a government to rescue Italy from looming financial disaster after talks with all parties Sunday.

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BERLIN

German industrial equipment maker Siemens AG swung back to profit in its fiscal fourth quarter as sales increased in Asia.

The company said Thursday it made a net profit of euro1.23 billion ($1.66 billion) in the three months to end-September in contrast to the loss of euro396 million loss in the same quarter a year ago, when the company had a large one-time charge at its health care division.

The company increased its dividend but gave an outlook for only moderate sales growth and indicated it didn’t expect profits to rise next year.

Revenues rose 5 percent to euro20.35 billion, boosted by a 12 percent increase in Asia. The company said Thursday sales grew across all regions and experienced particularly strong growth in emerging markets.

Orders, however, fell 2 percent and the company forecast only “moderate” sales growth. It said its outlook for earnings in the coming year were “based on the high level we achieved in the prior year” and foresees earnings from continuing operations that are unchanged, excluding one-time gains from exiting its nuclear partnership with Areva.

Company CEO Peter Loescher said the company had performed well thanks to its balanced portfolio of businesses but warned that the economic environment ahead was uncertain.

“The macroeconomic environment continues to be volatile and difficult to assess,” he said.

He said he expected growth in Europe’s core markets but that turmoil from Europe’s debt crisis could hurt the business environment in southern Europe _ which remains only 5 percent of Siemens’ business.

The company raised its dividend to euro3.00 per share from euro2.70 per share last year.

Across Siemens divisions, its fossil-fuel power generation unit raised earnings by 10 percent to euro407 billion. Its power transmission equipment divisions, however, saw earnings slip 28 percent due to costs of hedging raw materials costs and the emergence of new competitors in low-cost countries.

Munich-based Siemens makes a wide range of heavy industrial goods, including trains and streetcars, power generating and transmission equipment, diagnostic machines for hospitals and factory automation and equipment.

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ROME

Eastman Kodak Co. warned Thursday that its survival over the next year hinges on its ability to sell its potentially lucrative digital-imaging patents or raise extra funds by selling debt.

Its cautionary statement in a securities filing came as the embattled photography pioneer posted a wider $222 million loss for the third quarter. Its cash reserves fell almost 10 percent in the quarter.

Revenue tumbled 17 percent in the July-September period, with surging sales of inkjet printers more than offset by slumping digital camera and film revenue.

Kodak trimmed its full-year outlook, warning that revenue could be 1.5 percent to 4 percent lower than expected and losses might drop to the low end of its previous forecast.

Its shares fell 10 cents, or 8.8 percent, to $1.10 in midday trading after sinking as low as $1.07 earlier in the day. It traded as low as 54 cents a share on Sept. 30.

In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Kodak said it is seeking to raise an additional $500 million in financing that could be used to support “ongoing operational needs.”

Kodak said its ability to continue operations within the next 12 months “is dependent upon the ability to monetize its digital imaging patent portfolio through a sale or licensing” or by issuing additional debt.

Shrinking cash reserves, which fell to $862 million in the quarter from $957 million in June, have intensified investor fears of a looming bankruptcy. The company set a year-end cash target of $1.3 billion to $1.4 billion that excludes any intellectual-property licensing deals, down from a previous forecast of $1.6 billion to $1.7 billion.

“The reports of Kodak’s death, where everybody was expecting Kodak to go bankrupt, are premature,” Ulysses Yannas, a broker with Buckman, Buckman & Reid in New York, had said before the regulatory filing. “They continue to lose a lot of money but they have the wherewithal to become profitable again.”

“You’ve got a challenge here,” countered Shannon Cross of Cross Research in Livingston, N.J. “Kodak’s at a point where one of two things have to happen _ either they have to raise more money or they have to complete the sale (of digital-imaging patents). Otherwise, they’re not going to be able to continue.”

Kodak typically generates the bulk of its cash during the run-up to the holiday season. But worries that it’s burning through cash escalated in late September when it drew $160 million from a revolving credit line and enlisted the help of restructuring firms. Kodak insisted it had no intention of filing for bankruptcy protection.

Its third quarterly loss in a row _ its ninth such loss in the last three years _ amounted to 83 cents per share in the quarter. That compares with a loss of $43 million, or 16 cents per share, a year earlier.

Analysts surveyed by FactSet expected a smaller loss of 42 cents a share for the latest quarter.

Revenue dipped to $1.46 billion from $1.76 billion a year ago, with shrinking film group sales falling 10 percent to $389 million. Consumer digital-imaging sales tumbled 38 percent to $408 million as Kodak shifts to pricier camera models to try to offset intense competition from smartphones and video cameras.

The company said it posted modest patent royalties in the quarter but didn’t specify how much. Its year-ago results were lifted by a $210 million licensing deal with an undisclosed digital-camera competitor.

Since 2005, Kodak has poured hundreds of millions of dollars into new lines of inkjet printers that are finally on the verge of turning a profit. Home photo printers, high-speed commercial inkjet presses, workflow software and packaging are viewed as Kodak’s new core.

Revenue from those businesses rose by a combined 13 percent in the quarter, fueled by 89 percent growth in packaging solutions and 44 percent growth in home printers and ink. Kodak said it expects the consumer printer to become profitable in the current quarter.

The four businesses remain a bright spot in the 131-year-old company’s long and painful drive to recast itself into a reliably profitable player in the turbulent digital-imaging arena. Kodak is hoping they will more than double in size by 2013, accounting for 25 percent _ or nearly $2 billion _ of all sales.

In the meantime, mining its inventions for revenue has become indispensable. Since July, Kodak has been hawking a portfolio of 1,100 digital-imaging patents that many analysts think could fetch $2 billion to $3 billion.

A sale represents a sharp tactical shift. Kodak picked up just $27 million in patent-licensing fees in the first half of 2011 after amassing nearly $2 billion in the previous three years.

Based in Rochester, N.Y., Kodak turned picture-taking into a hobby for the masses over a century ago. It developed the world’s first digital camera in 1975 but failed to capitalize quickly on its new-wave know-how in digital photography.

Its workforce has plunged to 18,800 from 70,000 in 2002.

Kodak now expects segment losses in 2011 to be closer to $300 million, which is within its previous forecast range of $100 million to $300 million in losses. It expects revenue to be $6.3 billion to $6.4 billion, down from a previous forecast of $6.4 billion to $6.7 billion

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Stocks edged between small gains and losses Friday afternoon as traders scrutinized a plan to contain Europe’s debt crisis that sent the market soaring a day earlier.

The Dow Jones industrial average ended up nearly 23 points at 12,231. The Dow surged 339 points the day before, its biggest gain since Aug. 11. The Dow is headed for its biggest monthly gain since 1987.

“It’s a kind of sobering-up after a day of partying,” said Jerry Webman, chief economist with Oppenheimer Funds in New York.

European leaders unveiled a plan early Thursday to expand their regional bailout fund and force banks to keep bigger cash buffers. Banks agreed to forgive half of Greece’s debt. The Dow and the Standard & Poor’s 500 index both gained more than 3 percent.

Optimism ebbed on Friday as analysts raised questions about the plan, which lacks many key details. It is not yet clear how the rescue fund will work, for example. European markets mostly fell, and the euro declined against the dollar.

“We got back to what’s more of a square position, closer to where we want to be, and now we’re going to take a couple of deep breaths and reassess what this really means,” Webman said short term personal loan. He said there are still plenty of obstacles to overcome before the crisis is resolved.

One troubling sign: Borrowing costs for Italy and Spain increased, signaling that traders remain worried about their finances.

The S&P 500 index was up less than a point at 1,285. The Nasdaq composite index slipped a little over a point to 2,737.

The Dow is up 11.9 percent this month, the S&P 13.4 percent. Both indexes are on pace to have their best month since January 1987.

In less than four weeks, the Dow has risen 14.5 percent from its 2011 low, reached on Oct. 3. The S&P has gained 16.6 percent in that time. However, the Dow remains 4.8 percent below this year’s high, reached on April 29. The S&P is 6.1 percent below its high.

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Enterprise Holdings’ revenue rose to $14.1 billion for its 2011 fiscal year, a record for the privately-held company and a 12 percent increase from 2010.

Clayton-based Enterprise’s brands include Enterprise Rent-A-Car, National Car Rental and Alamo Rent a Car. Its fiscal 2010 revenue was $12.6 billion.

For its 2011 fiscal year that ended July 31, Enterprise grew its daily rental fleet by nearly 10 percent, to more than one million vehicles, the company said in a statement payday loans guaranteed no fax. The company had more than $2 billion in corporate travel revenues for fiscal 2011.

Enterprise, which is owned by the family of founder Jack Taylor, does not disclose profit figures.

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Enormous oil wealth lies thousands of feet below Libya, but whether it will be claimed, and by whom, now that Moammar Gadhafi is gone is very much an open question.

Drilling and shipping equipment has been damaged in the Libyan civil war, land mines must be cleared around oil fields, and a legal framework for how oil money is collected and distributed must still be worked out.

Whatever government is formed could open vast regions of Libya for drilling at reasonable terms _ or it could demand that foreign oil companies pay exorbitant royalties or require them to build infrastructure in exchange for access to oil.

Libya sits on the biggest reserves of oil in Africa. Those resources could help Libya recover from Gadhafi’s decades-long corruption and the civil war. Or the oil could be kept out of reach by political chaos, crumbling infrastructure or violence.

“It’s extraordinary how the Gadhafi regime squandered so much oil wealth and left it a deprived country in terms of infrastructure,” says Daniel Yergin, chairman of IHS CERA, an energy research firm, and author of a Pulitzer Prize-winning history of the oil industry. “The country will need oil revenues to rebuild and recover.”

The oil industry had already begun to recover in recent months, especially in parts of the country where fighting had long since stopped. Libya is producing about a quarter of the 1.6 million barrels per day of oil it pumped out before the war.

Gadhafi’s death reduces the threat of further fighting in other parts of the country, especially the west and south, where the country’s most important oil fields are. In the best outcome, the national oil company and international companies will soon be able to return to those fields, repair equipment and get oil flowing again.

Analysts say it will take about a year for the country to return to full oil production, but many uncertainties remain.

The country has the potential to someday produce much more oil than it has in recent years, but the oil industry could languish if Libya’s dozens of tribes can’t form a representative government and the country falls into chaos.

The first and most important step is to establish security, experts say. International oil companies with a presence there won’t bring in engineers to assess damage to oil fields and pipelines until they are reasonably sure their workers will be safe.

Gadhafi loyalists are thought to have planted land mines around critical oil infrastructure. Thousands of shoulder-fired missile systems have disappeared from Libyan weapons depots and could be in the hands of Gadhafi loyalists or insurgents.

“If you want to cripple the state, you attack its biggest source of revenue,” says Helima Croft, an analyst for Barclays.

Next, the country must set up a system for oil companies to negotiate contracts for finding, retrieving and selling oil. At least in the interim, it appears that a government oil minister will set policy, such as how much oil companies must pay to extract Libyan oil, and the head of the national oil company will oversee operations.

But the details will probably remain in flux until an interim government can be established. Until then, oil companies can’t be sure that their existing contracts in Libya will remain in effect, although the head of the national oil company has said contracts will be honored at least for a while. It would be up to an elected government to determine whether the contracts would be revised.

What’s most important, analysts say, is that oil companies feel assured that whatever terms are set will not change in the future. Otherwise, they will never agree to spend tens of billions of dollars to repair fields and infrastructure and restore production. Some of the nation’s oil fields, pipelines, refineries and shipping terminals are in relatively good repair, but others are badly damaged.

In general, though, analysts say infrastructure in Libya is in better shape than once feared.

“What we haven’t seen is oil fields blazing,” says Jon Marks, an Africa and Middle East expert with London-based consulting firm Cross-border Information.

Major international oil companies that operated in the country before the civil war, such as Italy’s Eni and Spain’s Repsol, are beginning to assess the situation and restore production in the oil fields offshore and in Libya’s east, long held by anti-Gadhafi forces.

But international oil companies have yet to assess oil fields in the south and west, which produce most of the nation’s oil. U.S. companies that were active in Libya before the war, including Hess Corp. and Marathon Oil Corp. have not returned workers to the country.

Nuri Berruien, the head of the national oil company, told The Associated Press earlier this month that most of the damage appears to be from corrosion. Some older oil fields, such as those of the Sirte basin, require water or natural gas injection to maintain pressure in the reservoir, and that has not been done for more than six months.

Two important oil terminals, which are needed to export oil, are said to be severely damaged, but another is said to have suffered little damage. Also, looters have made off with essential oil field equipment such as power generators, pumps and trucks.

And there are other issues. Many of the country’s most experienced and senior oil engineers are seen by workers as Gadhafi loyalists. At one field, workers are refusing to work until these top engineers are removed.

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AP Business Writers Tarek El-Tablawy in Kabul, Afghanistan, Alan Clendenning in Madrid, and Adam Schreck in Dubai contributed to this story.

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Apple’s latest iPhone arrived to an enthusiastic response from buyers camped out at stores Friday, but many observers noted the crowds were smaller than those that had gathered for previous releases.

The iPhone 4S, which went on sale in seven countries, is faster and comes with better software and an improved camera.

But with the fifth unveiling of its popular iPhone, Apple is finding it difficult to maintain the excitement of past iPhone introductions. For starters, the phone is more widely available than in the past. In addition to Apple stores, people can buy the phone from one of three wireless carriers: AT&T Inc., Sprint Nextel Corp. and Verizon Wireless. Some Best Buy, Target and Walmart stores and authorized resellers also carry the phones. Buyers also were able to pre-order the phone on Apple’s website and have it shipped to their home or office.

Many diehard Apple fans and investors were disappointed that Apple didn’t launch a more radically redesigned new model _ an iPhone 5. It’s been more than a year since Apple’s previous model was released.

That also may have contributed to smaller gatherings at some Apple locations.

“People are not as excited about this version as they might have been if a (iPhone) 5 came out,” said Charles Prosser, 50, a retired teacher and a computer technician from Tuscaloosa, Ala.

Even so, hundreds of buyers camped out in front of stores for hours to be among the first to get an iPhone 4S. About 200 people were at Apple’s Fifth Avenue store in Manhattan as the iPhone 4S went on sale.

Steve Wozniak, who created Apple with Steve Jobs in a Silicon Valley garage in 1976, was first in line at a store in Los Gatos, Calif., having arrived on his Segway the afternoon before.

Wozniak, who typically waits in line for new Apple products, said he barely slept Thursday night as he was busy chatting with Apple fans, taking photos and giving autographs. Wozniak pre-ordered two new iPhones; on Friday, he bought two more.

“I just want to be part of an important event, so I feel it more deeply,” he said.

Many said the event resembled a remembrance to Jobs, who died last week, a day after Apple Inc. announced the new phone.

Emily Smith, a 27-year-old user experience designer in New York, checked in to the line on the location-centric social network Foursquare. She got a virtual Steve Jobs badge that read: “Here’s to the crazy ones. ThankYouSteve.”

Others joked that the 4S model stood “for Steve.”

Tony Medina, a 25-year-old student from Manhattan, got in line at 11 p.m. and stayed despite getting soaked by an overnight thunderstorm. He said he planned on ordering the phone online, but decided to join the crowds to honor Jobs. “For loyalty, I felt I had to do the line,” he said. “I had to say thank you.”

In Chicago, Nicole Pacheco, 17, dragged her brother and a friend out to buy Apple’s latest gadget.

“I wanted to see how it was, to come out here for once,” she said as she looked at the line that stretched past her. “We’re kind of a memory for Steve Jobs. It’s one of his last inventions. It kind of motivated me to get the next one.”

As was the case with past Apple product launches, employees at many Apple stores greeted customers with cheers and smiles and congratulated them on their purchases. The company provided free coffee.

Dina Nguyen, who works at the Great America amusement park in Santa Clara, came to the store with her brother, Kennedy, to pick up four iPhones for their family. They are the first Apple products for the siblings. Their mom has the iPhone 4.

The siblings said it was a bit sentimental to get the phones now, right after Jobs’ death.

“He left a good legacy. He had a good life. He wanted to make people happy. It’s good to support that,” Kennedy Nguyen said.

Apple and phone companies in seven countries started taking orders for the iPhone 4S last Friday. Apple said Monday that more than 1 million orders came in, breaking the record set by last year’s model, which was available in fewer countries and on fewer carriers.

The death of Jobs could be helping sales. Marketing experts say products designed by widely admired figures such as Jobs usually see an upsurge in sales after their death.

Una Chen, a 24-year-old banker, said she was just happy to swap out her BlackBerry Bold for the new iPhone, particularly after a BlackBerry outage affected her phone this week.

“It’s not good to have a phone and not be able to use it,” Chen said.

The base model of the iPhone 4S costs $199 in the U.S. with a two-year contract. It comes with 16 gigabytes of storage. Customers can get 32 gigabytes for $299 and 64 gigabytes for $399. Customers have a choice of white or black.

The phones also debuted Friday in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan and Britain. They are coming to 22 more countries by the end of the month.

The phone has a faster processor and an improved camera compared with last year’s model. It has a new operating system that allows users to sync content without needing a computer. It also includes a futuristic, voice-activated service that responds to spoken commands and questions such as “Do I need an umbrella today?”

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