Applix Shares Up on 4Q Profit Increase

WESTBOROUGH, Mass. (AP) -- Business management software provider Applix Inc. said its fourth-quarter earnings nearly tripled on a tax benefit and higher software license revenue, sending shares surging 20 percent in morning trading.

After the bell Thursday, the company said net income rose to $6 million, or 34 cents per share, from $2.5 million, or 15 cents per share, in the year-ago period. The latest period includes a tax benefit of $4.2 million, or 24 cents per share.

Excluding the tax gain, a stock-based compensation charge and other costs, adjusted earnings were $3 million, or 17 cents per share, for the current quarter, up from $2.7 million, or 16 cents per share, on the same basis last year.

The results beat Wall Street's 14-cent consensus estimate, according to analysts polled by Thomson Financial.

Quarterly revenue climbed 44 percent to $16 million versus $11.1 million in the previous year. Software license sales grew to $9.6 million from $6.6 million, and professional services and maintenance revenue rose to $6.4 million from $4.4 million.

Shares of Applix climbed $2.18, or 20 percent, to $13.07 in morning trading on the Nasdaq Stock Market, having earlier hit a new 52-week high of $13.50. The shares previously traded in a 52-week range of $6.33 and $11.85.

$25M Offered to Reduce Climate Change

LONDON (AP) -- British tycoon Sir Richard Branson on Friday announced a $25 million prize for the first scientist to come up with a way to extract greenhouse gases from the atmosphere.

The Virgin Group chairman was joined by former Vice President Al Gore and other leading environmentalists as he announced the challenge.

Branson compared it to the competition launched in 1675 to devise a method of estimating longitude accurately. It was 60 years before English clock maker John Harrison discovered an accurate method and received his prize from King George III.

"The Earth cannot wait 60 years. We need everybody capable of discovering an answer to put their minds to it today," Branson said.

Gore said the planet had a "fever" that had to be taken seriously.

"Up until now, what has not been asked seriously on a systematic basis is, is there some way that some of that extra carbon dioxide may be scavenged effectively out of the atmosphere? And no one knows the answer to that," Gore said.

In September, Branson pledged to invest $3 billion to fight global warming, saying he would commit all profits from his travel firms -- including Virgin Atlantic airline and Virgin Trains -- over the next 10 years.

As part of that pledge, he launched a new Virgin Fuels business, which is to invest up to $400 million in green energy projects in the next three years.

SiRF Files Patent Complaint With ITC

SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) -- A unit of SiRF Technology Holdings Inc., a maker of global positioning system location technology, said Friday it asked trade officials to see if Global Locate Inc. is violating its patents.

SiRF said its SiRF Technology Inc. unit filed a complaint in the U.S. International Trade Commission that seeks to prevent Global Locate from importing GPS devices that use technology SiRF says is patented.

The move comes eight weeks after SiRF filed a patent infringement suit against Global Locate and its U.S. distributor, Innovation Sales Southern California, in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.

SiRF shares rose 32 cents on the Nasdaq in morning trading to $31.18.

Oil Prices Hover Below $60 a Barrel

LONDON (AP) -- Oil prices briefly rose above US$60 a barrel Friday for the first time since early January, lifted by tension between Iran and the U.S., violence in Nigeria and frigid U.S. temperatures.

Light, sweet crude for March delivery rose 13 cents to US$59.84 in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange by Friday afternoon London time.

Oil prices have risen steadily over the last two weeks on news of bitter winter weather in the U.S., the world's biggest oil consumer. On Thursday, the contract jumped US$2 to settle at US$59.71 a barrel -- the highest settlement price since Dec. 29.

Before Friday, crude oil had not traded above US$60 a barrel on the Nymex since Jan. 3, the first trading day of the year.

Tetsu Emori, chief commodities strategist at Mitsui Bussan Futures in Tokyo, thought the price increase was an overreaction.

"The surge is quite hard to understand. It seems traders are looking at the short term -- heating oil demand and geopolitical tensions -- when they should be looking at the medium and long term," Emori said.

"We have to remember that the geopolitical risks, especially in relation to Iran, have not really been realized in terms of affecting supply, and that the winter season will be over in a month," he said.

The Brent crude contract for March fell 11 cents to US$58.92 a barrel on the London ICE Futures exchange.

On Thursday, Iran stepped up its warnings to the United States, which rekindled worries that supplies out of the oil producer could be hindered. Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Tehran would strike U.S. interests around the world if his country is attacked.

Though the comments didn't immediately cause a spike in prices, it kept prices from falling, as did ongoing forecasts of cold weather throughout the United States, and news of a shutdown at an Occidental Petroleum Corp. crude and natural gas field in California.

The market was also watching violence in Nigeria, where a Frenchman was kidnapped Thursday in the latest of a spate of violence targeting oil workers.

More than 100 foreigners have been seized in a year of stepped-up attacks across Nigeria's southern region, where the crude is pumped. More than 40 have been seized in the past month alone. The violence in Africa's biggest oil producer has cut daily output by nearly a quarter.

In other Nymex trading, natural gas was down 2 cents to US$7.851 per 1,000 cubic feet. On Thursday it settled at US$7.871, its highest settlement price of the year. Natural gas, the more popular form of home heating in the United States, has risen more than 60 percent over the past month on the recent cold weather. It is trading around the same level it was this time last year.

Heating oil rose 0.16 cents to US$1.7266 a gallon.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration continues to forecast normal to below-normal temperatures across the United States until at least Feb. 22.

Primedia Mulls Sale of Enthusiast Media

NEW YORK (AP) -- Specialty magazine publisher Primedia Inc. said Friday it is considering selling its Enthusiast Media division.

The unit's titles include Motor Trend, Hot Rod, Automobile and Automotive.com among more than 70 publications and 90 web sites.

In December Primedia said it would sell its hunting, fishing and outdoor titles to private equity firm InterMedia Partners LP for $170 million in cash.

"Given the multiples Primedia received from the sale of the Outdoors Group and the particularly strong investment and debt markets, the board believes the best course of action for primedia shareholders is exploring the complete sale of the enthusiast media segment," Chairman, President and Chief Executive Dean Nelson said in a statement.

Nelson said the board is also considering a spinoff of its Consumer Source division, which would create two separate publicly traded companies.

Consumer Source publishes and distributes free consumer guides including Apartment Guide, Auto Guide and New Home Guide.

Shares of Primedia added 31 cents, or 18.8 percent, to $1.96 in morning trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

MasterCard 4Q Profit Beats Expectations

NEW YORK (AP) -- MasterCard Inc., one of the world's largest credit-card brands, said Friday its fourth-quarter profit topped Wall Street expectations as strong consumer spending boosted transactions. The results drove shares of MasterCard to an all-time high before tumbling in early trading.

The Purchase-based company, which went public in May 2006, posted quarterly profit of $41 million, or 30 cents per share, compared with a loss of $53 million, or 39 cents per share, a year earlier. Excluding the impact of litigation settlements, MasterCard reported a profit of $41 million, or 31 cents per share, in the latest period.

Revenue rose 17.2 percent to $839 million from $716 million a year ago.

Results surpassed projections for profit of 17 cents per share on revenue of $826.9 million, according to analysts polled by Thomson Financial. "We are quite pleased with our financial performance in the fourth quarter," said President and Chief Executive Robert Selander in a conference call. "We look forward to leveraging our momentum in the industry, and take advantage of our customer-focused strategy, to keep deliver these kinds of results."

This is the second earnings report since MasterCard went public. The company's $2.39 billion initial public offering was used to unwind holdings by thousands of U.S. banks that controlled the company, and it now counts hedge funds like Atticus Management LLC and mutual funds like Fidelity among its biggest investors.

MasterCard does not deal with consumers directly, but issues its brand to banks and other financial institutions and makes money from processing fees when consumers use credit or debit cards. The company also makes money from payment-related services.

It processed $532 billion in global transactions, up 14 percent from the year-ago period. The company said it issued 817 million MasterCard-branded cards as of Dec. 31, up 12 percent from the year-ago period.

Also Friday, Mastercard raised its quarterly cash dividend by 66.7 percent to 15 cents per share from 9 cents per share. The dividend is payable May 10 to shareholders of record on April 9.

The results come as stronger consumer spending has bolstered results from a number of MasterCard's biggest rivals. American Express Co. and Morgan Stanley's Discover card division all reported better-than-expected results from their credit card business.

Meanwhile, credit card businesses bolstered results from issuers like Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Citigroup Inc.

Visa, which operates the biggest credit card network in the U.S., said in October it plans to sell shares to the public something this year. The company hopes to streamline its operations, and insulate its member banks from legal damages it faces over antitrust and unfair-pricing claims brought by merchants.

The IPO for MasterCard raised about $650 million to fund a war chest to protect itself from legal troubles. Selander said Friday there was nothing new to report in the way of settlements.

The stock soared to a high of $118.07 in the first few minutes of trading, before falling $2.97, or 2.6 percent, to $111.76 in morning trading. The stock has doubled since going public.

Britain's Trade Deficit Hits New High

LONDON (AP) -- Britain's overall trade deficit hit a record high in 2006, according to official data released Friday, partly due to the fact that the nation has become a net importer of oil.

The Office for National Statistics said the goods trade deficit was 84.3 billion pounds ($164.1 billion; 126.3 billion euros) last year, up sharply from 68.8 billion pounds in 2005. It is the highest deficit since records began in 1697.

The balance on oil trade widened to 3.7 billion pounds ($7.2 billion; 5.5 billion euros) last year from 2.2 billion pounds in 2005.

Higher imports of aircraft and silver widened the deficit on so-called "erratic" goods to 3.2 billion pounds ($6.2 billion; 4.8 billion euros), from 600 million pounds in 2005.

The Statistics Office said the goods trade deficit in December alone also was wider than expected.

The goods trade deficit widened to 7.1 billion pounds ($13.8 billion; 10.6 billion euros) in December as exports of aircraft and capital goods fell from a revised 6.9 billion pounds the month before. The November deficit had originally been published as 7.2 billion pounds.

3M Takes 100 Percent Stake in Tape Maker

ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) -- The 3M Co., which makes Post-it notes and Scotch tape, said Friday it paid $36 million for Sealed Air Corp.'s half stake in PolyMask Corp., a maker of protective films.

The deal with Sealed Air, which expects a gain of 22 cents per share in the first quarter due to the sale, gives 3M a 100 percent interest in PolyMask.

And 3M plans to use its full control to expand more quickly into the electronics, construction, aerospace, marine and automotive markets with industrial adhesives and tapes, the company said.

Finmeccanica, Russian Railways Sign Deal

MILAN, Italy (AP) -- Italian defense company Finmeccanica SpA said Friday it had signed a memorandum of understanding with state-owned JSC Russian Railways for the creation of a high-speed rail link between Moscow and St. Petersburg.

Italy's state-owned railway operator Ferrovie dello Stato also signed the memorandum.

Finmeccanica and Ferrovie dello Stato did not provide any financial details nor did the company say when construction would begin.

"We hope to sign the binding agreement in March," said Ferrovie dello Stato Chief Executive Mauro Moretti.

Finmeccanica said in October it had signed an agreement with JSC Russian Railways to work together on the production, technical assistance, and marketing of rolling-stock and rail infrastructure in Russia.

Moretti said the three-way partnership also aimed to develop high-tech railway products to export to international markets, especially in Eastern Europe.

The partnership is watching with interest a tender to build a US$2 billion (euro1.54 billion) railway in Saudi Arabia, in which Russian Railways is participating, he said.

The winner of the tender was expected to be announced at the start of 2007, according to a Russian press report. It will be the longest railway in the Middle East.

NYC Gun Stings Questionable, Feds Say

NEW YORK (AP) -- Private investigators hired by the city to conduct sting operations on out-of-state gun shops could be breaking the law, and the dealers they caught making illegal sales will not be prosecuted, federal officials said Thursday.

City officials have sued more than two dozen dealers after hiring investigators to pose as buyers attempting straw purchases, in which one person fills out the paperwork for the gun but is buying for someone else. The scam is often used by convicted felons and others barred from owning firearms.

The city argues that the shops -- in Georgia, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina and Virginia -- are responsible for many of the illegal weapons that end up in New York, and the suits have led seven dealers to agree to more scrutiny.

The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives announced in May it was reviewing whether the city acted legally.

"Potential legal liabilities" arise when civilians do the work of law enforcers, Department of Justice spokesman Bryan Sierra said Thursday. The department has decided charges are not warranted against dealers in the sting cases, he said.

It was unclear whether the private investigators could face charges.

Deputy Mayor Ed Skyler dismissed the department's suggestion that investigators could be breaking the law.

"When illegal guns are sold in our city, that's putting people at great physical risk, and that's more important," he said Thursday. "The city has followed the law, and there's no reason we shouldn't continue to do these operations."

Some of the gun sellers have asked a judge to dismiss the lawsuits, saying the city is out of bounds because the dealers are not doing business in New York.

Gun rights advocates have criticized the sting operations, and the Second Amendment Foundation issued a statement Thursday calling the Department of Justice's findings a "significant victory."