Anglonautes > English vocabulary > Economy > Business

The worst business loss in UK history 26 February 2009
Royal Bank of Scotland came a step closer to full-scale nationalisation today
as the bank unveiled a record £24.1 billion loss
and plans to raise up to £25.5 billion from the taxpayer
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/the-worst-business-loss-in-uk-history-1632568.html

be medium return

bail-out

bail out
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/banking_and_finance/article2451069.ece

overheads
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/natural_resources/article3310399.ece

book value -- assets minus liabilities
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/02/28/business/AP-Buffett-Letter.html

cost

costs

cost cutting

cost-saving move

slash costs

go into administration
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/dec/24/zavvi-administration-jobs
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/economics/article4446284.ece

administrations
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/economics/article4446284.ece

go bust
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/economics/article4446284.ece

to the wall
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/economics/article4446284.ece

file for bankruptcy protection / file for Chapter 11 protection USA
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2012/01/19/eastman-kodak-files-for-bankruptcy/
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE4A936V20081110

be liquidated
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/economics/article4446284.ece

philanthropy
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-02-26-big-donations_x.htm

charity
http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/services/2008-10-26-fundraising-crisis-donations-charities_N.htm
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/public_sector/article5372778.ece
http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/services/2008-10-26-fundraising-crisis-donations-charities_N.htm

sponsor
http://society.guardian.co.uk/children/story/0,,2108439,00.html

HSBC profits double to almost £12bn

• Unnamed highest-paid banker earned over £8.4m in 2010
• Chief executive Stuart Gulliver earned £6.1m

Monday 28 February 2011
10.49 GMT
Guardian.co.uk
Jill Treanor
This article was published on guardian.co.uk at 10.49 GMT
on Monday 28 February 2011.
It was last modified at 15.40 GMT on Monday 28 February 2011.
It was first published at 09.28 GMT on Monday 28 February 2011.

HSBC revealed that its highest-paid banker took home more than £8.4m last year as it reported that profits more than doubled to $19bn (£11.8bn) in 2010.

The UK's largest bank also admitted that more than 253 of its staff were paid more than £1m last year and that some 89 of these were based in the London.

The bank said 280 of its most senior employees had shared in bonuses of $374m. Some 186 of these were in the UK and their share of the bonuses was $172m. This means key bankers in the UK get paid an average bonus of $920,000 verses $1.3m group-wide, although this is partly because the UK numbers include lower-paid staff involved in monitoring the bank's risks.

Information provided by the bank showed that if their salaries are included, those key staff earned a total of $471m, which averages at $1.7m – just over £1m.

Stuart Gulliver, who took over as chief executive at the start of the year, is to take his £5.2m bonus in shares. His total pay was £6.1m, down on the £10m he received a year ago when he was the highest-paid employee of the bank.

While the chief executive's office is Hong Kong, Gulliver joked that he lives on Cathay Pacific and British Airways, spending a third of his time in the UK, a third in Hong Kong and a third in the air.

For 2010, the highest-paid banker – who is not named – received between £8.4m and £8.5m; one took £6.8m and three received between £6.3m and £6.4m.

HSBC provides more information about pay than other financial institutions because it is listed in Hong Kong, which demands disclosure of the five highest-paid staff. In banking, the biggest earners are often outside the boardroom.

Under Project Merlin, the deal between major banks and the UK government, the disclosure is different and only requires the pay of the five highest-paid executives outside the boardroom – rather than all bankers and traders – to be disclosed. Under this measure the highest-paid executive received £4.2m.

The information about the bonus pool for senior staff is being provided to comply with a new Financial Services Authority rule, which requires so-called "code staff" – those deemed to be high paid and taking big risks – to have their pay published in aggregate.

Gulliver replaced Michael Geoghegan as chief executive after a very public boardroom reshuffle. For 2010 Geoghegan received £5.8m after his £2m salary and benefits were topped by a £3.8m bonus. He is also to receive £1m for 2011 and a pension contribution of £401,250 under the terms of his contract. While he stepped down at the end of December, he will receive £200,000 in consultancy fees to 1 April, which he will donate to charity.

The bank cut its long-term return on equity target to 12%-15% from a previous 15%-19% target, blaming the costs caused by regulations requiring banks to hold more capital and extra liquid instruments that can be sold quickly in a crisis. The shares fell 4% to 682p as the market digested numbers which, Gulliver admitted, showed income was flat, costs were up and that profits had been bolstered by the $12.4bn fall in impairments to $14bn – the lowest level since 2006.

The new finance director, Iain Mackay, said: "We've targeted 12% to 15% through the cycle for return on equity, principally taking into consideration what we view as a somewhat unstable and uneven economic recovery over the coming years as well as much higher capital requirements."

Commenting on the profits, which were below the $20bn estimated by analysts, Gulliver said: "Underlying financial performance continued to improve in 2010 and shareholders continued to benefit from HSBC's universal banking model.

"All regions and customer groups were profitable, as personal financial services and North America returned to profit. Commercial banking made an increased contribution to underlying earnings and global banking and markets also remained strongly profitable, albeit behind 2009's record performance, reflecting a well-balanced and diversified business."

HSBC's new chairman, Douglas Flint – who was the finance director until he replaced Stephen Green in December – said the group would not forget the financial crisis and support from governments around the world, adding the group entered 2011 "with humility". Green's departure to join the government as trade minister caused the bank to reorganise its top team last year.

But Flint hit out against George Osborne's permanent levy on bank balance sheets, saying that if the chancellor removed the levy – which will cost HSBC about $600m – the bank would increase its payouts to shareholders. The final dividend was announced at 12 cents, up from 10 cents at the same point last year.

Flint was also concerned about the new rules that force banks to hold more liquid instruments such as government bonds. "It will be a near impossibility for the industry to expand business lending at the same time as increasing the amount of deposits deployed in government bonds while, for many banks but not HSBC, reducing dependency on central bank liquidity support arrangements," he said.

"It is to be hoped that the observation period, which starts this year and precedes the formal introduction of the new requirements, will inform a recalibration of these minimum liquidity standards."

For 2009 the bank reported a 24% fall in pre-tax profit to $7bn (£4.63bn), which included a total bill for salaries and bonuses of $18.5bn, down 11%.

HSBC profits double to almost £12bn, G, 28.2.2011,
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/feb/28/hsbc-profits-double-almost-twelve-billion-pounds

Corporate Profits Were the Highest on Record Last Quarter

November 23, 2010
The New York Times
By CATHERINE RAMPELL

The nation’s workers may be struggling, but American companies just had their best quarter ever.

American businesses earned profits at an annual rate of $1.66 trillion in the third quarter, according to a Commerce Department report released Tuesday. That is the highest figure recorded since the government began keeping track over 60 years ago, at least in nominal or non-inflation-adjusted terms.

Corporate profits have been going gangbusters for a while. Since their cyclical low in the fourth quarter of 2008, profits have grown for seven consecutive quarters, at some of the fastest rates in history.

This breakneck pace can be partly attributed to strong productivity growth — which means companies have been able to make more with less — as well as the fact that some of the profits of American companies come from abroad. Economic conditions in the United States may still be sluggish, but many emerging markets like India and China are expanding rapidly.

Tuesday’s Commerce Department report also showed that the nation’s output grew at a slightly faster pace than originally estimated last quarter. Its growth rate, of 2.5 percent a year in inflation-adjusted terms, is higher than the initial estimate of 2 percent. The economy grew at 1.7 percent annual rate in the second quarter.

Still, most economists say the current growth rate is far too slow to recover the considerable ground lost during the recession.

“The economy is not growing fast enough to reduce significantly the unemployment rate or to prevent a slide into deflation,” Paul Dales, a United States economist for Capital Economics, wrote in a note to clients. “This is unlikely to change in 2011 or 2012.”

The increase in output in the third quarter was driven primarily by stronger consumer spending. Wages and salaries also rose in the third quarter, which might help bolster holiday spending in the final months of 2010.

Private inventory investment, nonresidential fixed investment, exports and federal government also contributed to higher output. These sources of growth were partially offset by a rise in imports, which are subtracted from the total output numbers the government calculates, and a decline in housing and other residential fixed investments.

Corporate Profits Were the Highest on Record Last Quarter, NYT, 23.11.2010, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/24/business/economy/24econ.html

Income Inequality: Too Big to Ignore

October 16, 2010
The New York Times
By ROBERT H. FRANK

PEOPLE often remember the past with exaggerated fondness. Sometimes, however, important aspects of life really were better in the old days.

During the three decades after World War II, for example, incomes in the United States rose rapidly and at about the same rate — almost 3 percent a year — for people at all income levels. America had an economically vibrant middle class. Roads and bridges were well maintained, and impressive new infrastructure was being built. People were optimistic.

By contrast, during the last three decades the economy has grown much more slowly, and our infrastructure has fallen into grave disrepair. Most troubling, all significant income growth has been concentrated at the top of the scale. The share of total income going to the top 1 percent of earners, which stood at 8.9 percent in 1976, rose to 23.5 percent by 2007, but during the same period, the average inflation-adjusted hourly wage declined by more than 7 percent.

Yet many economists are reluctant to confront rising income inequality directly, saying that whether this trend is good or bad requires a value judgment that is best left to philosophers. But that disclaimer rings hollow. Economics, after all, was founded by moral philosophers, and links between the disciplines remain strong. So economists are well positioned to address this question, and the answer is very clear.

Adam Smith, the father of modern economics, was a professor of moral philosophy at the University of Glasgow. His first book, “A Theory of Moral Sentiments,” was published more than 25 years before his celebrated “Wealth of Nations,” which was itself peppered with trenchant moral analysis.

Some moral philosophers address inequality by invoking principles of justice and fairness. But because they have been unable to forge broad agreement about what these abstract principles mean in practice, they’ve made little progress. The more pragmatic cost-benefit approach favored by Smith has proved more fruitful, for it turns out that rising inequality has created enormous losses and few gains, even for its ostensible beneficiaries.

Recent research on psychological well-being has taught us that beyond a certain point, across-the-board spending increases often do little more than raise the bar for what is considered enough. A C.E.O. may think he needs a 30,000-square-foot mansion, for example, just because each of his peers has one. Although they might all be just as happy in more modest dwellings, few would be willing to downsize on their own.

People do not exist in a social vacuum. Community norms define clear expectations about what people should spend on interview suits and birthday parties. Rising inequality has thus spawned a multitude of “expenditure cascades,” whose first step is increased spending by top earners.

The rich have been spending more simply because they have so much extra money. Their spending shifts the frame of reference that shapes the demands of those just below them, who travel in overlapping social circles. So this second group, too, spends more, which shifts the frame of reference for the group just below it, and so on, all the way down the income ladder. These cascades have made it substantially more expensive for middle-class families to achieve basic financial goals.

In a recent working paper based on census data for the 100 most populous counties in the United States, Adam Seth Levine (a postdoctoral researcher in political science at Vanderbilt University), Oege Dijk (an economics Ph.D. student at the European University Institute) and I found that the counties where income inequality grew fastest also showed the biggest increases in symptoms of financial distress.

For example, even after controlling for other factors, these counties had the largest increases in bankruptcy filings.

Divorce rates are another reliable indicator of financial distress, as marriage counselors report that a high proportion of couples they see are experiencing significant financial problems. The counties with the biggest increases in inequality also reported the largest increases in divorce rates.

Another footprint of financial distress is long commute times, because families who are short on cash often try to make ends meet by moving to where housing is cheaper — in many cases, farther from work. The counties where long commute times had grown the most were again those with the largest increases in inequality.

The middle-class squeeze has also reduced voters’ willingness to support even basic public services. Rich and poor alike endure crumbling roads, weak bridges, an unreliable rail system, and cargo containers that enter our ports without scrutiny. And many Americans live in the shadow of poorly maintained dams that could collapse at any moment.

ECONOMISTS who say we should relegate questions about inequality to philosophers often advocate policies, like tax cuts for the wealthy, that increase inequality substantially. That greater inequality causes real harm is beyond doubt.

But are there offsetting benefits?

There is no persuasive evidence that greater inequality bolsters economic growth or enhances anyone’s well-being. Yes, the rich can now buy bigger mansions and host more expensive parties. But this appears to have made them no happier. And in our winner-take-all economy, one effect of the growing inequality has been to lure our most talented graduates to the largely unproductive chase for financial bonanzas on Wall Street.

In short, the economist’s cost-benefit approach — itself long an important arrow in the moral philosopher’s quiver — has much to say about the effects of rising inequality. We need not reach agreement on all philosophical principles of fairness to recognize that it has imposed considerable harm across the income scale without generating significant offsetting benefits.

No one dares to argue that rising inequality is required in the name of fairness. So maybe we should just agree that it’s a bad thing — and try to do something about it.

Robert H. Frank is an economics professor at the Johnson Graduate School of Management at Cornell University.

Income Inequality: Too Big to Ignore, NYT, 16.10.2010, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/17/business/17view.html

Profit Dropped 66% in Quarter at Exxon Mobil

July 31, 2009
The New York Times
By JAD MOUAWAD

Exxon Mobil, the world’s biggest publicly traded oil company, said Thursday that its profit dropped 66 percent in a second quarter after a sharp fall in oil prices in the last year.

The oil giant reported that its net income fell to $3.95 billion, or 81 cents a share, from $11.68 billion, or $2.22 a share, in the period a year ago.

Capital spending fell 6 percent to $6.56 billion in the quarter.

“Global economic conditions continue to impact the energy industry both in the volatility of commodity prices and reduced demand for products,” the company’s chairman and chief executive, Rex W. Tillerson, said in a statement.

The company’s combined oil and gas production fell 3 percent in the quarter, because of restrictions imposed by OPEC producers and lower output from mature fields. Exxon’s oil production in the quarter averaged 2.35 million barrels a day and gas production was about 8.01 billion cubic feet a day. The company said it increased its output from new projects in Qatar and in the United States.

Profit at the company’s production and exploration unit fell to $3.81 billion in the second quarter, down $6.2 billion compared with a year earlier. In its refining business, Exxon saw its profit drop to $512 million, down $1.05 billion from a year ago. That included a loss of $15 million at Exxon’s domestic refining business.

Despite the lower profit, Exxon continued its program to reward shareholders by buying back shares and paying dividends. The company spent $5.2 billion in the second quarter to buy back 75 million shares.

Exxon’s report caps a week of lower earnings across the energy industry after oil prices tumbled from last year’s record levels and the global economy slowed down. Oil prices, which had reached a record closing price of $145.29 a barrel last July, recently traded around $63 a barrel.

The global recession is expected to reduce oil consumption around the world for a second consecutive year, the first time that’s happened since the early 1980s. Oil companies, which are struggling to adapt to a new environment of lower prices and slower demand, have responded by slashing costs, paring down drilling activities and shutting some operations.

Earlier on Thursday, Royal Dutch Shell reported that its net profit fell 67 percent in the second quarter, to $3.82 billion, from $11.6 billion in the period a year ago. Sales were $63.9 billion, down from $131.4 billion in the quarter a year ago. The company said that it planned to reduce capital spending by more than 10 percent next year to about $28 billion and that it would cut jobs.

Earnings at Shell’s exploration and production unit dropped 77 percent, to $1.33 billion, from $5,9 billion a year ago, mostly on lower oil prices. Production declined 6 percent, to 2.9 million barrels of oil and equivalents a day, while prices were $52.62 a barrel, down from $111.92 in the period a year ago.

“Our second quarter results were affected by the weak global economy. Shell’s chief executive, Peter R. Voser, said. “This weakness is creating a difficult environment both in upstream and downstream.”

On Wednesday, ConocoPhillips, the third-largest American oil company after Exxon and Chevron, said that its quarterly profits tumbled 76 percent, to $1.3 billion, after a loss in its refining business. Chevron reports its earnings on Friday.

The British oil giant BP said earlier this week that its profit declined 53 percent, to $4.39 billion. The company said it would reduce its costs by $3 billion this year, $1 billion more than it had initially planned. The company’s chief executive, Tony Hayward, also signaled that he expected oil prices hover in a range of $60 to $90 a barrel.

Julia Werdigier contributed reporting.

Profit Dropped 66% in Quarter at Exxon Mobil, NYT, 31.7.2009, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/31/business/global/31oil.html

Microsoft Profit Falls for First Time in 23 Years

April 24, 2009
The New York Times
By ASHLEE VANCE

Fresh off one of the worst quarters in company history, Microsoft offered investors little evidence that a beleaguered personal computer market would recover anytime soon.

On Thursday, Microsoft set the wrong kind of record, as it reported the first year-over-year quarterly revenue decline since it first sold stock to the public in 1986. In its third quarter, which ended March 31, Microsoft said its revenue fell 6 percent, to $13.65 billion, from $14.45 billion. It reported net income of $2.98 billion, or 33 cents a share — a 32 percent drop from the $4.39 billion, or 47 cents a share, reported in the period last year.

The company’s Windows franchise has come under unprecedented pressure during the recession as consumers and businesses have shied away from buying new computers or have purchased cheaper machines. While Intel, the chip maker, said last week that the worst of the PC decline had passed, Microsoft displayed no such confidence.

“I didn’t see any improvement at the end of the quarter that gives me encouragement that we are at a bottom and coming out of it,” Christopher P. Liddell, Microsoft’s chief financial officer, said during a conference call to discuss the company’s results. “They stopped getting worse, but that’s different from they started getting better.”

The recession has generated a series of firsts for Microsoft, including its first large layoff and first decline in Windows sales.

Microsoft, based in Redmond, Wash., said its earnings included 6 cents of charges related to the layoffs and impairments to investments.

Analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters had expected Microsoft to earn 39 cents a share, excluding the one-time charges, on revenue of $14.1 billion.

Intel supplies the processors for most PCs, while Microsoft supplies the key operating system software.

Last week, Intel’s chief executive, Paul S. Otellini, declared that “the worst is now behind us.”

Mr. Liddell of Microsoft maintained a more somber tone. “While we would all like to think a recovery will be soon and painless, we actually believe it will be slow and painful,” he said.

Still, shares of Microsoft rose in after-hours trading after release of the results as investors apparently took solace from the company’s cost-cutting efforts.

Microsoft has lowered its forecast of its operating expenses by as much as $1 billion for the year.

“Microsoft, like everyone else, has got serious about cost-cutting,” said Brendan Barnicle, a software analyst with Pacific Crest Securities. “They never really had to do that before, and investors had been hoping they would cut more.”

Microsoft’s online services business, which competes with Google and Yahoo, continued to disappoint observers as a depressed advertising market pushed sales down to $721 million, from $843 million.

“The online business looked bad, but I still believe they have to be in that space to fulfill the larger vision of where Microsoft is going,” said Richard Williams, the senior software analyst at Cross Research. “It may mean that they have to acquire rather than build.”

Microsoft has been in talks with Yahoo about some kind of partnership in online advertising.

In the company’s core Windows business, sales declined to $3.4 billion in the quarter, down from $4 billion in the period last year.

Netbooks, the cheap, small laptops that have surged in popularity, remained the big story. According to Microsoft’s research, PC sales fell 7 to 9 percent during the quarter. Excluding netbooks, traditional PC sales fell 15 to 17 percent.

Last quarter, netbooks accounted for about 10 percent of PC sales, Microsoft said. Netbooks are a mixed blessing for Microsoft. The company’s average selling price for Windows has declined, because it ships a discounted version of the older Windows XP on netbooks. Microsoft’s Windows profit fell 19 percent, to $2.5 billion.

On a positive note, many customers have bought netbooks as complements to their existing computers, representing fresh revenue for Microsoft and Intel during these lean times.

However, “there are some real challenges in that business behind this shift to the low end,” said Israel Hernandez, director of software research at Barclays Capital. “And on the horizon, you have Apple and Google who appear ready to introduce their own takes on netbooks.”

Microsoft declined to offer specific financial guidance for the coming quarters.

Shares of Microsoft ended regular trading Thursday at $18.92, up 14 cents. The company released third-quarter figures after the market closed, and in after-hours trading the shares rose more than 3 percent, to $19.50.

Microsoft Profit Falls for First Time in 23 Years, NYT, 24.4.2009, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/24/technology/companies/24microsoft.html

Goldman Sachs Reports $2.1 Billion Quarterly Loss

December 17, 2008
The New York Times
By BEN WHITE

Goldman Sachs’s long run of profitable quarters came to an end Tuesday as the bank announced a fourth-quarter loss of $2.12 billion, driven by big markdowns on its large portfolio of proprietary investments in everything from Japanese golf courses to Chinese banks.

It was the first losing quarter since Goldman went public in 1999 and demonstrates that even some of Wall Street’s most skilled operators have not been able to overcome historically tough markets and sagging economies across the globe.

Goldman sidestepped earlier losses by staying out of the high-risk subprime mortgage market and taking an early bet against the United States housing industry. But it has been unable to avoid taking big markdowns following nearly 30 percent declines across global equity markets in its fiscal fourth quarter, which ended in November.

Goldman’s quarterly loss, which amounted to $4.97 a share, kicks off a run of what are expected to be poor banking results. Morgan Stanley will report its earnings on Wednesday, and is expected to announce a loss of around $400 million.

Revenue in Goldman’s big trading and principal investment business was negative $4.36 billion compared with $6.93 billion in the fourth quarter of last year.

Goldman slashed compensation and expenses and benefits by 46 percent in 2008 to $10.93 billion, reflecting lower payments because of poor performance. None of Goldman’s top seven executives will take a bonus for this year. Morgan Stanley has made a similar decision.

Employment at the firm, which had been 32,569 at the end of the third quarter, decreased 8 percent. Goldman has said it will reduce head count by a total of 10 percent, but some analysts believe it will need to make deeper cuts to reflect declining revenue and a slowing global economy.

After the announcement, Moody’s, the debt rating agency, downgraded the long-term senior debt ratings of Goldman Sachs to A1 from Aa3. Other ratings were affirmed but the outlook on them remains negative. Goldman shares, down 70 percent this year amid the financial crisis, rose nearly 8 percent, to $71.68 in early trading.

David Viniar, Goldman’s chief financial officer, said it an interview that about $1 billion in losses came in real estate investments while $600 million came in its stake in the shares of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China.

“Over time, a lot of those are great investments,” he said, reiterating the belief within Goldman that these were largely unavoidable losses that will be reversed as market conditions improve. The same cannot be said for banks with huge holdings in subprime mortgages and related securities that may never recover much of their value, according to Goldman executives.

Mr. Viniar said it was too soon to say when markets might recover but that huge efforts by governments in the United States and around the world should begin having positive effects.

“Economies around the world are quite slow but governments around the world are throwing in enormous resources,” he said. “You don’t know when they will kick in. They may already have kicked in, or they may kick in in a year.”

Mr. Viniar reiterated the view privately expressed by Goldman officials that he does not believe the bank needs to make a major acquisition to help its balance sheet. He noted that the bank reduced its balance sheet to about $885 billion at the end of the quarter from $1 trillion last quarter. He added that $111 billion of that is free cash that does not need to be funded.

Both Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley have transformed themselves into deposit-taking bank holding companies that have direct access to borrowing from the Federal Reserve but must also take less risk by law.

Speculation has centered on Goldman’s buying a retail bank or a trust bank that manages money for large institutions and wealthy individuals.

Goldman executives have looked at many possible acquisitions but found none that were both cheap and strategically useful.

Goldman Sachs Reports $2.1 Billion Quarterly Loss, NYT, 17.12.2008, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/17/business/17goldman.html

Ford Plans More Cuts as It Posts a $129 Million Loss

November 7, 2008
The New York Times
By BILL VLASIC and NICK BUNKLEY

The Ford Motor Company, battered by the weak economy and a shift in consumer preferences, announced more cost cuts on Friday and reported a third-quarter loss.

Ford said it lost $129 million, or 6 cents a share, less than the $380 million, or 19 cents a share, in the third quarter a year ago.

In its statement, Ford said it would cut another 10 percent of its salaried work force in North America. The company also said that it had used up $7.7 billion in cash.

Third-quarter sales were $32.1 billion, down from $41.1 billion a year ago. Ford said the decline reflected lower sales volume, the sale of Jaguar and Land Rover units, changing product mix and lower net pricing.

Excluding special items, Ford lost was about $3 billion, or $1.31 a share, compared with a loss of $24 million, or a penny a share, a year ago. On that basis, analyst surveyed by Thomson Reuters expected a loss of 94 cents a share.

Rival General Motors will report results later Friday.

Underscoring the dire circumstances facing the industry, the chief executives of G.M., Ford and Chrysler met with Nancy Pelosi, the House speaker, and Harry Reid, the Senate majority leader, on Thursday about an emergency loan package. The meeting focused on a request by automakers for up to $25 billion in loans to help the companies get through the worst vehicle market in 15 years and avoid bankruptcy protection.

The loan request is in addition to $25 billion in low-interest loans administered by the Department of Energy to assist automakers in developing more fuel-efficient vehicles.

Automakers have been battered by a weak economy, rising gas prices, a sharp shift away from their most profitable products and a credit crisis that has emptied dealer showrooms. The stunning falloff has affected all automakers, as shaky consumer confidence and the inability of many eager shoppers to get loans because of tight credit drove sales down 31.9 percent in October compared with the period a year ago.

Ford lost $8.6 billion in the first half of 2008. Its sales in the United States are down 18.6 percent this year through October.

Not long ago, it was viewed as being in the worst shape of the three Detroit automakers, but now, as its two crosstown rivals — G.M. and Chrysler — explore a merger to avoid running out of cash, Ford has become the most stable. It still has a large cash cushion — $26.6 billion as of June — from mortgaging most of its North American assets in 2006, before the credit markets tightened.

“Despite meaningful production declines forecasted for the coming quarters, we estimate that Ford has enough cash through 2009,” Brian A. Johnson, an analyst with Barclays Capital, wrote in a report this week.

After losing $18.8 billion in the first six months of the year, G.M., suffered an even further decline in fortunes in the third quarter.

The company’s global sales fell 11.4 percent in the quarter, with most of the damage done in the slumping vehicle markets of North America and Europe.

A lack of available credit for consumers has hurt all automakers this fall, but G.M. has been particularly hard hit by the problems of the finance unit GMAC Financial Services.

GMAC is controlled by Cerberus Capital Management, which has a 51 percent ownership stake. G.M. owns the remaining 49 percent. GMAC reported a $2.52 billion loss in the third quarter, mostly because its lack of access to available capital choked off the flow of auto loans to G.M. customers.

As a result, G.M.’s dealers have been increasingly unable to finance sales to even creditworthy customers. In October, G.M.’s United States sales plunged 45.1 percent, compared with a 31.9 percent drop for the overall industry.

Those declining sales have cut sharply into G.M.’s revenues and crippled its previously announced turnaround plans.

With the company burning through cash, G.M. said in July that it would increase its liquidity by cutting costs by $10 billion, and by raising $5 billion through new borrowing and asset sales.

But the company has been unable to take on new debt, and has been unable to sell any major assets like its Hummer brand.

With revenues declining and its cash reserves rapidly diminishing, G.M. began looking for a merger partner this summer, according to people with knowledge of the company’s actions.

G.M.’s chairman, Rick Wagoner, first approached Ford, but its leadership rejected the overtures. In September, G.M. began talks with Chrysler, which is also controlled by Cerberus.

While both sides are committed to merging the two automakers, the deal has stalled because prospective lenders have been hesitant to support it without assurances of government assistance to Detroit.

Mr. Wagoner and other G.M. executives have repeatedly vowed that the automaker will not seek bankruptcy protection.

Analysts, however, believe that without an infusion of capital from the government, G.M. will exhaust its cash reserves by sometime next year.

For its part, Ford has reacted aggressively in recent months to the downturn, announcing a plan to convert three truck plants so they can build small cars instead and to bring six fuel-efficient vehicles to the United States from Europe in the next few years.

It is beginning a major new-product blitz, introducing a redesigned version of its stalwart F-series pickup this fall and more revamped models, including new versions of the Taurus and Mustang, next year. It is counting on strong sales of the F-series, despite lessened demand for trucks, to lift its short-term fortunes.

Any momentum that Ford has been building, though, took a big hit last month when its largest shareholder, the casino mogul Kirk Kerkorian, began selling off his stake. Mr. Kerkorian had previously expressed confidence in the company and in the leadership of the chief executive, Alan R. Mulally, and that support pushed shares of the company to more than $8 in May. But the company’s stock hit a 26-year low of $1.88 last month.

Ford Plans More Cuts as It Posts a $129 Million Loss, NYT, 7.11.2008, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/07/business/08auto.html

Exxon Mobil Posts Biggest US Quarterly Profit Ever

October 30, 2008
Filed at 9:01 a.m. ET
The New York Times
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

HOUSTON (AP) -- Exxon Mobil Corp., the world's largest publicly traded oil company, reported income Thursday that shattered its own record for the biggest profit from operations by a U.S. corporation, earning $14.83 billion in the third quarter.

Bolstered by this summer's record crude prices, the Irving, Texas-based company said net income jumped nearly 58 percent to $2.86 a share in the July-September period. That compares with $9.41 billion, or $1.70 a share, a year ago.

The previous record for U.S. corporate profit was set in the last quarter, when Exxon Mobil earned $11.68 billion.

Revenue rose 35 percent to $137.7 billion.

On average, analysts expected the company to earn $2.39 per share in the latest quarter on revenue of $131.4 billion.

Exxon Mobil's results got a boost of $1.62 billion in the most-recent quarter from the sale of a natural gas transportation business in Germany. It also took a special, after-tax charge of $170 million related to a punitive damages award related to the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill.

Excluding those items, third-quarter earnings amounted to $13.38 billion -- nearly 15 percent above its previous profit record from the second quarter.

As expected, Exxon Mobil posted massive earnings at its exploration and production, or upstream, arm, where net income rose 48 percent to $9.35 billion. Higher oil and natural gas prices propelled results, even though production was down from the third quarter a year ago.

Oil producers are coming off a quarter during which crude prices reached an all-time high of $147.27 -- and their profits have reflected it. Crude prices, however, have quickly fallen 50 percent from the summer's highs, and the global economic malaise has raised questions about energy demand at least into 2009.

Some companies, especially smaller producers, are scaling back spending on new exploration and production projects because of the uncertainty, though analysts say that its less likely to happen at the well-heeled giants like Exxon Mobil.

Company shares rose 96 cents to $75.61 in premarket trading.

Exxon Mobil Posts Biggest US Quarterly Profit Ever, NYT, 30.10.2008, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/business/AP-Earns-Exxon-Mobil.html

$2.8 Billion Loss Reported at Citigroup on Write-Downs

October 17, 2008
The New York Times
By ERIC DASH

Citigroup reported a $2.8 billion loss in the third quarter, the fourth consecutive period that the global banking giant has been swamped by write-downs on investments and steeper losses on consumer loans.

The bank took more than $13.2 billion in charges in the third quarter, bringing the total amount of write-offs and credit losses since the credit crisis began last year to more than $64 billion.

And as more signs of a global slowdown surface, the bank continues to come under pressure. Although the write-downs in its investment bank declined for the third quarter, losses in Citigroup’s global consumer businesses rose sharply. Credit costs increased 84 percent, to $9.1 billion driven by charge-offs and reserve increases in the bank’s credit card, consumer finance and banking operations.

Every major region of the world where Citigroup operates, with the exception of the one anchored by the Middle East, reported a decline in revenue.

The quarterly loss was a stark reversal from the $2.2 billion the bank earned in the period a year ago. The loss was 60 cents a share, compared with a gain of 42 cents a share in the third quarter a year ago. Revenue fell 23 percent, to $16.7 billion.

Vikram S. Pandit, Citigroup’s chairman and chief executive, said in a statement that the bank’s results reflected a “difficult environment” and write-downs as the bank sheds more than $400 billion in noncore operations, low-returning assets and toxic mortgages. Citigroup also eliminated 11,000 jobs in the third quarter, bringing the total number of layoffs to 23,000 this year,

Although Mr. Pandit said they were making “excellent progress,” he gave no indication of when the bank would return to profitability.

Mr. Pandit only hinted at the $25 billion investment stake that Citigroup accepted along with eight other big banks at the behest of Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. And Mr. Pandit did not address Citigroup’s failed bid for the Wachovia Corporation, a move that executives believed was a potentially game-changing deal for Citigroup’s domestic banking franchise. Wells Fargo swooped in with a counteroffer that derailed the bid; both sides are now waging an intense battle in the courts.

Citigroup has long been considered a bellwether for the global financial services industry. Its range of businesses, from investment banking to credit cards, and sprawling international reach are rivaled by only a handful of banks.

On paper, the diversified bank was supposed to be the ideal business model for these tumultuous times. But as the markets gyrated wildly and the global economy teeters, Citigroup shares have plummeted along with most other banks.

Citigroup is the latest big bank to announce results in what is expected to be yet another dismal quarter for nearly all financial firms. Merrill Lynch, which sold itself to Bank of America, also reported a $5.1 billion loss on Thursday morning, the fifth consecutive loss. Earlier, Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo and State Street reported earnings that were similarly muted by sobering economic projections. And dozens of small and regional banks have not yet reported their results.

Much of Citigroup’s loss was concentrated in investment banking, which is known as the institutional clients group. The unit reported $81 million in negative revenue, hurt by write-downs. Chief among those was $4 billion tied to its various exposures to faltering home loans, including assets belonging to various structured investment vehicles; $1.2 billion tied to Alt-A mortgages and $919 million related to its exposure to bond insurance companies. It included a $792 million charge tied to lending to private equity deals, a once-lucrative business that has left Citi with billions of dollars in loans and bonds it cannot sell.

In other earnings, the Bank of New York Mellon reported a 53 percent decline in third-quarter profit. The bank earned $303 million, or 26 cents a share, in the quarter, compared with $642 million, or 56 cents, in the quarter a year ago.

The bank took a charge of 37 cents a share, or $433 million, to bail out money market mutual funds, cash sweep funds and other investments affected by the bankruptcy filing of Lehman Brothers Holdings.

Profit, excluding one-time charges, was $908 million, or 79 cents a share. Revenue was $3.9 billion. Analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters had expected earnings of 66 cents a share and revenue of $3.69 billion.

$2.8 Billion Loss Reported at Citigroup on Write-Downs, NYT, 17.10.2008, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/17/business/17bank.html

Profit Data May Explain U.S. Gloom

August 1, 2008
The New York Times
By FLOYD NORRIS

Corporate profits earned in the United States rose much more rapidly from 2005 through 2007 than had been earlier reported, making the subsequent fall seem even more precipitous, government figures showed Thursday.

The revised figures may help to explain the sense of pessimism that has been reported in surveys of consumers and business executives, said Robert Barbera, the chief economist of ITG, an economic research company. Pointing to the previous profit figures, some commentators had suggested there was more gloom than the economic data seemed to justify.

First-quarter profits earned in the United States by American companies have fallen 18 percent from their peak, the revised figures show, rather than the 11 percent previously reported.

That decline has been partly offset by soaring overseas profits for American companies. On Thursday, the government raised its estimate of those profits in the first quarter, even as it reduced its estimate of profits earned in this country.

By the latest measure, first-quarter overseas profits were the highest they have ever been for American companies — up 25 percent from the third quarter of 2006, when domestic profits peaked.

Overseas profits, while important to shareholders, do not reflect the performance of the American economy or the prospects for employment in this country. Surveys show that both business executives and consumers expect declines in jobs in America in coming months.

The figures show that more than a third of profits earned by American companies are now made overseas. In the first three months of this year, the proportion was 35 percent, nearly twice what it was a decade ago.

The revised data shows that profits of American companies are down 7 percent over all, rather than the 2 percent previously reported.

The revised figures were contained in the revisions of the gross domestic product numbers issued Thursday by the Bureau of Economic Analysis, a part of the Commerce Department.

Brent R. Moulton, the bureau’s associate director for national economic accounts, said the new figures reflected preliminary data from the Internal Revenue Service for 2006, and revised figures for 2005. For 2007 and 2008, the changes reflect assorted revisions in estimates of the performance of various industries.

Because the figures are largely based on tax returns, the eventual totals are used as clear indicators of overall economic performance of American businesses, both privately owned companies and those owned by shareholders.

The revised figures indicate that in the third quarter of 2006, when domestic profits of American companies peaked, the annual rate of profits was $1.27 trillion, $100 billion more than had previously been estimated. That figure fell to $1.04 trillion in the first quarter of this year, the lowest rate since the third quarter of 2005.

By contrast, the overseas profits of American companies came in at an annual rate of $557 billion in the first quarter of 2008, an increase of more than $100 billion from the 2006 quarter.

The profit figures in the government report represent operating profits, not changes in the value of assets. That policy means that the profit figures for financial industries estimated by the government are now far higher than the ones being reported to shareholders. Mr. Moulton said that write-downs of the value of securities, or write-offs of bad loans — which have cost banks tens of billions of dollars — are not included.

Were they included, it seems certain that the decline in profits earned in the United States by American companies would be even larger than was indicated by the figures released Thursday.

Profit Data May Explain U.S. Gloom, NYT, 1.8.2008, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/01/business/economy/01profit.html

Exxon’s Second-Quarter Earnings Set a Record

August 1, 2008
The New York Times
By CLIFFORD KRAUSS

HOUSTON — Exxon Mobil reported the best quarterly profit ever for a corporation on Thursday, beating its own record, but investors sold off shares as oil and natural gas prices resumed their recent decline.

Record earnings for Exxon, the world’s largest publicly traded oil company, have become routine as the surge of oil prices in recent years has filled its coffers. The company’s income for the second quarter rose 14 percent, to $11.68 billion, compared to the same period a year ago. That beat the previous record of $11.66 billion set by Exxon in the last three months of 2007.

Exxon’s profits were nearly $90,000 a minute over the quarter, but it was less than Wall Street had expected. Exxon’s shares fell 4.6 percent, to close at $80.43. (The company calculates that it pays $274,000 a minute in taxes and spends $884,000 a minute to run the business.)

The disappointment from investors is bound to put added pressure on Exxon Mobil’s chairman and chief executive, Rex Tillerson, to search for new fields in politically precarious areas of Africa and the Middle East.

The sell-off in Exxon stock, as well as other oil company stocks, continued a trend of recent weeks as oil and natural gas prices have fallen sharply from record levels. But investor disappointment was also a response to problems that surfaced in the company’s report, particularly a 10 percent drop in oil production and a 3 percent decline in natural gas production from the second quarter of 2007.

The production decrease, the second quarterly drop in a row, was viewed with concern by energy analysts, especially since the company spent $7 billion to find and produce from new fields, nearly 40 percent more than in the same quarter last year.

“It raises the question of whether the company has been underinvesting the last few years,” said Brian Youngberg, an energy analyst at Edward Jones, an investment firm. “High commodity prices are driving the record earnings, not growth in production volumes of oil and gas.”

Crude oil prices in the second quarter averaged more than $124 a barrel, 91 percent higher than the same quarter in 2007, according to a recent report by Oppenheimer & Company, an investment bank. Natural gas prices averaged $10.80 for every thousand cubic feet, up 43 percent from the quarter a year ago. After spiking even higher in early July, prices settled on Thursday at $124.08 for oil and about $9.18 for natural gas.

Despite its production problems, Exxon earned $10 billion in the quarter from exploration and production, up from $6 billion in the same period a year ago. But the company’s $1.6 billion in profit from refining was less than half that in last year’s quarter because of lower worldwide refining margins. Earnings from its chemical business of $687 million were down $326 million from last year.

Company officials said they were working hard to increase production with new projects in Africa, the Middle East and the Gulf of Mexico. The company reported that it intended to disburse $125 billion in capital spending over the next five years in an effort to produce more oil and natural gas.

Royal Dutch Shell, Eni and Repsol, three of Europe’s largest oil companies, also reported strong profits on Thursday, although their production results disappointed analysts. Shell reported its output had declined by 1.6 percent in the quarter, and Repsol’s production fell by nearly 20 percent. Eni’s production was slightly higher.

Nevertheless Shell, Europe’s largest oil company, reported a 33 percent increase in second-quarter profit, to $11.56 billion, from $8.67 billion in the period a year ago.

Oil companies are under pressure to find new reserves as their traditional fields age and they face increasing competition from state-run oil companies in Russia and the Middle East. Shell is also looking to make up for production lost in Nigeria, where militants attacked an offshore production vessel in June, and in Russia, where it had to sell its share in the Sakhalin Island oil and natural gas project to the state-controlled energy company Gazprom last year.

Adding together the output of all the major international oil companies, including Chevron, Conoco, BP, Shell, Total and Exxon, this appears to be the fourth straight quarter of production declines, according to Barclays Capital analysts. Barclays said the total decline might exceed 600,000 barrels a day, reflecting the difficulties the oil companies had in gaining access to new regions to make up for the decline of mature fields. (Total will report its results on Friday.)

Exxon’s oil and natural gas production tumbled in the second quarter because of Venezuela’s expropriation of Exxon’s assets last year, labor and political strife in Nigeria and declining production in many fields around the world.

Meanwhile, under the terms of Exxon’s contracts, governments in Russia, Angola and other places where it operates gained a larger share of production from Exxon and other international companies as crude oil prices rose. With prices now declining, Exxon may show higher production levels in future quarters even if profit is not as robust.

Democrats in Congress were quick to criticize Exxon’s profit, hoping that the resentment felt by many drivers over high gasoline and diesel prices could help them in an election year.

“Inside the boardrooms at the major oil companies, it’s Christmas in July,” said Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York. “What’s shocking is that Big Oil is plowing these profits into stock buybacks instead of increasing production or investing in alternative energy.”

The company purchased $8 billion of its own shares over the quarter, reducing shares outstanding by 1.7 percent.

Kenneth Cohen, an Exxon vice president, said oil companies needed the profits to search for more oil and gas. He also challenged Congress to open up waters in the Gulf of Mexico and off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts to drilling, as well as other federal lands where drilling is prohibited.

“Our Congress needs to give us access to those areas that are currently off limits to the industry,” he said.

Exxon’s income of $2.22 a share compared with $10.26 billion, or $1.83 a share, in the same quarter a year ago. Revenue rose 40 percent, to $138.1 billion, from $98.4 billion in the quarter a year ago.

Julia Werdigier contributed reporting from London.

Exxon’s Second-Quarter Earnings Set a Record, 1.8.2008,
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/01/business/01oil.html

Write-Down Is Planned at Merrill

July 29, 2008
The New York Times
By LOUISE STORY

Only 10 days after stunning Wall Street with a huge quarterly loss, Merrill Lynch unexpectedly disclosed another multibillion-dollar write-down on Monday and sought to bolster its finances once again by selling new stock to the public and to an investment company controlled by Singapore.

Moving to purge itself of the tricky mortgage-linked investments that have brought the once-proud firm to its knees, Merrill said that it had sold almost all of the troublesome investments, once valued at nearly $31 billion, at a fire-sale price of 22 cents on the dollar.

As a result, Merrill expects to record a write-down of $5.7 billion for the third quarter. Such an outcome could push Merrill into the red for a fifth consecutive quarter if revenue remains weak and would bring its charges since the credit crisis erupted last summer to more than $45 billion.

The problems at Merrill, the nation’s largest brokerage, underscore how bankers and policy makers are struggling to contain the damage to the financial system and the broader economy caused by the collapse of housing-related debt. The latest news came on a day when the International Monetary Fund said there was no end in sight to the housing slump, a forecast that depressed financial shares as well as the broader market.

To shore up its finances, Merrill said it would raise $8.5 billion in new capital from common shareholders, including $3.4 billion from the investment arm of the Singapore government, Temasek Holdings, which, with an 8.85 percent stake as of June 30, is already Merrill’s largest shareholder. Those shares and a conversion of preferred securities into common stock will dilute the value of stock held by current shareholders by about 40 percent.

John A. Thain, who has struggled to turn Merrill around since becoming chief executive in December, said the sale of the worrisome investments, known as collateralized debt obligations, or C.D.O.’s, was “a significant milestone in our risk reduction efforts.”

The C.D.O.’s have plunged in value over the last year, forcing Merrill to take one write-down after another and sapping investors’ confidence. Merrill’s share price fell 11.6 percent on Monday, before the news of the write-down and stock sale were announced after the close of trading. Merrill is trading near its lowest level in a decade.

But the sale of the C.D.O.’s, to an investment fund based in Dallas, may enable Merrill to move on, investors said.

“What they sold, from a headline standpoint, is certainly constructive because they have reduced risk in a very sensitive area,” said Thomas C. Priore, chief executive of Institutional Credit Partners, a $12 billion hedge fund and C.D.O. manager in New York.

Merrill had been working on the C.D.O. sale and the effort to raise capital before its earnings call but did not finalize the actions until recent days.

Merrill’s sales could cause further write-downs at other Wall Street firms with C.D.O. exposure. If those companies — the likes of Citigroup and Lehman Brothers — have similar C.D.O.’s valued at prices higher than those at which Merrill sold, the firms may be forced to take additional charges to reflect the difference.

Merrill recently moved to raise money by selling its 20 percent stake in Bloomberg L.P., the financial news and data company, for $4.425 billion. Mr. Thain hinted at the C.D.O. sale in the quarterly earnings call, in response to a question from Meredith Whitney, an analyst with Oppenheimer & Company.

“Why not, at this point, be the first to purge assets and get it over with? And, if that means raising capital, raise capital,” Ms. Whitney said.

Mr. Thain responded that Merrill had been selling assets but had not yet sold any C.D.O.’s.

“Your question is a very leading one, and that would certainly be something that we would hope that we could do,” Mr. Thain said.

Merrill sold the investments at a steep loss. The United States super senior asset backed-security C.D.O.’s that Merrill sold were once valued at $30.6 billion. As of the end of second-quarter, Merrill valued them at $11.1 billion — or 36 cents on the dollar. And Merrill sold them for $6.7 billion to an affiliate of Lone Star Funds, the Dallas private equity firm.

Merrill provided 75 percent financing to Lone Star Funds, which means Merrill lent the private equity fund about $5 billion to complete the sale.

The discounted sales will cause the majority of Merrill’s write-down in the third quarter.

Merrill also said it had settled a battle with the reinsurance company XL Capital Assurance, which had insured some of the firm’s C.D.O.’s.

Write-Down Is Planned at Merrill, NYT, 29.7.2008, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/29/business/29merrill.html

BP profits soar on record oil price

Published: July 29 2008 08:33
Last updated: July 29 2008 08:33
The Financial Times
By Sylvia Pfeifer

Record crude prices and soaring natural gas prices helped BP on Tuesday to report a 28 per cent rise in second-quarter profits to $9.46bn (£4.74bn), from $7.37bn a year ago.

Replacement cost profit, which excludes gains from the value of the company’s crude oil inventories, was up 6 per cent to $6.85bn for the quarter. It rose 23 per cent to $13.44bn for the second half.

The strong results helped lift BP’s shares nearly 2 per cent to 528½p in early morning trading in London.

The company has been locked in a bitter battle for control of its Russian joint venture, TNK-BP, which accounts for almost a quarter of BP’s worldwide production.

BP’s Russian partners have demanded the dismissal of Robert Dudley, who heads up TNK-BP, who they say is treating the venture as a subsidiary of BP. Mr Dudley fled Russia last week to run the business from a secret location abroad.

In its results statement, BP warned that while it continued to work to resolve these matters, “currently it is not possible to predict the ultimate outcome if these matters remain unresolved”.

Meanwhile, the company said production for the second quarter was broadly flat compared with the same period in 2007, at 3.83m barrels of oil equivalent per day. BP is counting on the start-up of the long-delayed Thunder Horse field in the Gulf of Mexico to boost output in the coming months.

Profits at the company’s refining division collapsed from $2.7bn to $539m. The company said higher energy costs continued to hit the division’s profits, especially in the US.

BP said it would pay a dividend of 14 cents a share for the quarter, up from 10.825 cents.

BP profits soar on record oil price, FT, 29.7.2008,
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ae695a68-5d3e-11dd-8129-000077b07658.html

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