Filed under: Company News When we hear of pharmaceutical companies’ ventures it’s usually either a straight merger & acquisition or a collaboration on a drug or two in their pipelines to share costs and, of course, potential profits. But Pfizer Inc. ( PFE ) and GlaxoSmithKline ( GSK...

Filed under: Economy The dollar has had much working against it in the past decade: roughly eight years of policy errors, an inability by public officials to recognize the mercantilism of major economic powers, and (until recently) a U.S. consumer unable to curb profligate spending habits. But the buck...

Filed under: Company News , Economy Sony Ericsson succumbed to rapidly falling global handset sales. The number of units it shipped in the first quarter dropped 35 percent compared with the same period last year, and the joint venture posted a 293 million-euro ($382.7 million) net loss. Experts say...

Filed under: Economy Don’t look now but the U.S. economy is set to record another decent week. The stock market is about to post a weekly gain after surmounting the psychologically important Dow 8,000 level. The Q1 earnings season has, so far, not produced any “just dreadful” reports...

Filed under: Economy As I wrote earlier, some of the largest recipients of Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP) money want to pay it back. TARP was originally designed to buy toxic waste from banks, but it turned into a plan to put capital into banks in exchange for senior preferred stock. Since TARP...

Filed under: Company News , Economy , Earnings Filene’s Basement, the Boston-based discount chain that claims to be the very place where bargains are born , is on its deathbed. Vendors, who have been stiffed for months, have threatened to push the 25-store chain into bankruptcy, according to the...

Filed under: Company News A major union, the United Food and Commercial Workers, is beginning a new push to unionize workers at Wal-Mart ( WMT ). Congress has been working on new legislation that would make it much easier for labor to bargain and set up contracts. A numbers of companies, both large...

Filed under: Columns , Economy Are people going to spend $20 for an issue of Worth ? I would suspect not. The publicity gimmick by Sandow Media Corp., which bought Worth from CurtCo. Media last year, says a mouthful about the precarious state of the print media. First quarter magazine advertising revenue...

Filed under: Company News Citigroup Inc. ( C ) ended a five-quarter losing streak by posting a $1.6 billion profit on gains from an accounting rule that helps companies in distress. But the bank posted a loss per share of 18 cents because of payment of preferred dividends, beating analyst estimates...

Filed under: Company News , Earnings Today we have another example of why it is such a huge mistake to let companies write their own report cards . That’s right folks, Citigroup, Inc. ( C ) reported a $1.6 billion profit for the first quarter of 2009. Doesn’t this sound great? It sure does...