The Sappington Farmers Market, which filed for bankruptcy Friday, will remain open despite its troubles.
“The reorganization of Sappington Farmers Market will allow the store to remain open and viable,” said Nancy Smith, the market’s manager, in a written statement. “We feel this will position us to be successful in the future.”
Smith didn’t provide an interview.
The store, on Watson Road in Marlborough, has roots going back to the early 1980s and has been at its present location since 1995, where it has gained a loyal following of bargain hunters and proponents of local farming.
The store’s mission has long been to support area farmers by featuring their products.
In her statement released Saturday, Smith said the store would continue to feature local farmers and would continue distributing their products not only through the store but through schools, restaurants and a “mobile market.”
The store’s founder, Tessa Greenspan, sold it in 2008 to a cooperative of small-scale farmers known as the Missouri Farmers Union, which formed a company called Farm to Family Naturally LLC to buy the business.
Farm to Family Naturally, which does business as Sappington Farmers Market, was the organization that filed for bankruptcy on Friday.
Members of the original cooperative who purchased the store have since left, according to employees.
A slew of bad news on European banks has fueled fears about their ability to survive the debt crisis and raised the prospect of a new global credit crunch.
Five large lenders saw their credit ratings downgraded this week, and a sixth, Commerzbank, saw its stock plunge on speculation it might need more government support. As uncertainty grows that a fellow lender might collapse, banks are cutting back on lending to each other for fear of not getting their money back.
When that credit between banks dries up, loans soon stop flowing to businesses and households, stunting economic growth. On Thursday, the rates banks charge to lend dollar to one another remained at their highest level since September.
The heart of Europe’s problem is bad government debt _ a phrase that until recently was nearly an oxymoron. Government bonds of wealthy countries were long considered the safest of safe assets.
But as the debt loads of European countries soared, investors began to wonder if their governments could pay back the loans, so they began charging more to extend those loans. That only fed a vicious circle: The more governments had to pay to borrow money, the more trouble they had paying it back. Eventually, Greece had to admit it wouldn’t repay all of its loans _ and that shattered confidence in other eurozone countries. Would Italy renege? Would Spain? France?
European leaders have been struggling to reassure investors that they will pay back their debts and to work out a way to make sure they never again grow so large. But in the meantime, the bonds are all still out there, their value has plunged, and much of them sit in Europe’s banks.
In addition, banks are struggling to raise more cash for their rainy-day funds, their stocks are plunging and they’re facing higher borrowing rates.
“European banks remain the nexus of most European problems,” analyst Huw Van Steenis wrote in a Morgan Stanley research note.
It’s the banks that “transmit” the debt crisis to businesses and consumers, he argues. Because what were traditionally their safest assets _ government bonds _ are now among some of their most suspect, banks are struggling to secure the loans they need to fund their day-to-day operations. Until the debt crisis erupted, those government bonds typically served as collateral for loans from other banks.
When banks stop lending to one another, they also stop lending to the “real economy”: homeowners, consumers, businesses. The European Central Bank’s lending survey in October, the latest available, showed that standards for lending to businesses tightened significantly, and that banks expected them to tighten even further through the end of the year.
The banks also told the ECB that they were finding it increasingly hard to get their hands on loans. The percentage of banks saying their access to markets was tightening skyrocketed in the October report. They expected that situation to improve a bit toward the end of the year but to remain difficult.
Even that grim assessment may have been overly rosy: The rates banks charge each other to borrow dollars overnight has been steadily increasing in recent weeks. On Thursday, the rate known as LIBOR was 0.1505 percent _ a high matched once last week but not surpassed since late September.
The ECB has stepped in to lend to banks when no one else will. As a measure of how bad things have gotten, the ECB supplied banks with a total average of euro615.3 billion ($801 billion) in ready money to operate their businesses over the three months to Nov. 8. That’s up euro99.1 billion ($129 billion) from what banks needed in the previous three months.
World stocks were mostly lower Wednesday after the Federal Reserve refrained from offering new initiatives to help a slowly recovering U.S. economy.
Benchmark oil hovered below $100 per barrel while the dollar fell against the euro and the yen.
European stocks were mixed in early trading. Britain’s FTSE 100 rose 0.4 percent to 5,447.88. But Germany’s DAX lost 0.9 percent to 5,719.42 and France’s CAC-40 fell 1.1 percent to 3,043.60. Wall Street appeared headed higher, with Dow Jones industrial futures up 0.3 percent to 11,938 and S&P 500 futures rising 0.5 percent to 1,225.80.
Asian shares closed lower. Japan’s Nikkei 225 index fell 0.4 percent to end at 8,519.13, its lowest close in two weeks. South Korea’s Kospi lost 0.3 percent at 1,857.75 and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng shed 0.5 percent to 18,354.43. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 was flat at 4,190.50.
On mainland China, the benchmark Shanghai Composite Index fell 0.9 percent to 2,228.53, the lowest closing since March 2009. Benchmarks in Singapore, India and Indonesia fell while Taiwan and the Philippines rose.
The Fed on Tuesday said that the U.S. economy, while improving, is still weak. Unemployment remains high, and it remains vulnerable to the European debt crisis, which could push the continent into a recession and slow U.S. growth.
Analysts said markets were disappointed that the Fed refrained from a third round of large-scale purchases of Treasury securities, dubbed quantitative easing III or QE3.
“I think QE3 would be a welcome change to the status quo. I think the market was disappointed,” said Francis Lun, managing director of Lyncean Holdings in Hong Kong.
Sentiment also remained fragile amid threats by Standard & Poor’s to downgrade the credit ratings of 15 countries that use the euro because of the region’s debt crisis.
“We are likely to continue seeing some cautious trading as the threat of S&P coming out to issue some downgrades at some stage this week looms,” said Stan Shamu of IG Markets in Melbourne, Australia payday loan lenders.
“Some would argue that this is already priced in, but it will still likely rock the boat should it happen.”
Export shares in Japan were under pressure as the yen strengthened against a shaky euro. Sharp Corp. dropped 2.9 percent while Toshiba Corp. lost 1.2 percent. Honda Motor Corp. slid 2.2 percent.
Chinese property shares dropped after the government signaled that it would maintain price curbs on real estate.
“The government has set a clear tone for reining in runaway housing prices next year,” Wang Yulin of the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development was quoted as saying by Xinhua news agency.
Hong Kong-listed China Vanke Co. fell 0.6 percent and Evergrande Real Estate Group dived 3.9 percent.
Mainland Chinese shares slumped due to fears over slower economic growth and inflation, which “will make the market unstable in the short term,” said Li Jianfeng, an analyst at Caida Securities, based in Shanghai.
Shanghai Xinhua Media Co. lost 4 percent while Jiangsu Phoenix Publishing & Media Corp. 5.9 percent.
On Tuesday, the Dow Jones industrial average fell 0.6 percent to close at 11,954.94. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index fell 0.9 percent to 1,225.73. The Nasdaq composite fell 1.3 percent to 2,579.27.
Benchmark oil for January delivery was down 16 cents to $99.98 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract rose $2.37 to finish at $100.14 an ounce on the Nymex on Tuesday.
In currencies, the euro rose to $1.3047 from $1.3043 late Tuesday in New York. The dollar fell to 77.95 yen from 77.97 yen.
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AP researcher Fu Ting contributed from Shanghai.
Stocks are rising at the open on hopes for a plan to restore long-term confidence in the euro.
French and German leaders are meeting to discuss closer political and economic cooperation between the 17 nations that use the currency. They want tighter control of budgets, to prevent the kinds of debts that might to cause Greece and others to default.
Stocks overseas rose modestly Monday, while the yields on Italian bonds dove, suggesting traders believe that Italy is less likely to default. Italy’s government agreed this weekend on a package of austerity and economic growth measures.
The Dow is up 135 points, or 1.1 percent at 12,154. The S&P 500 is up 16, or 1.3 percent at 1,261. The Nasdaq composite index is up 32, or 1.2 percent at 2,659.
Lawmakers, responding to pleas from industry and foreign governments, have tentatively agreed to block the Obama administration from requiring that lithium batteries be treated as hazardous cargo because of the danger of fires during flight.
The deal came in talks on a long-term funding bill for the Federal Aviation Administration, Rep. Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., told The Associated Press. The bill will effectively block new battery-shipment rules by insisting the U.S. follow international standards, which are less stringent, said Rahall, top Democrat on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.
Pilot unions said the international standards don’t provide enough safety and are weaker than rules the administration proposed nearly two years ago but never made final. The unions and the National Transportation Safety Board for several years have sought new rules on air shipments of the batteries to prevent fires that can cause air crashes and deaths.
“We’re very concerned that unless this issue is addressed we’ll continue to see accidents and we’ll continue to see fatalities,” said Mark Rogers, who heads the Air Line Pilots Association’s committee on hazardous cargo.
The U.S. shouldn’t “adopt an existing international standard on lithium batteries that’s generally recognized as inadequate,” Robert Travis, president of Independent Pilots Association, which represents UPS pilots, said in a statement.
The FAA bill “is an opportunity for the U.S. to lead by setting a higher standard on the carriage of lithium batteries,” Travis said.
A fire broke out five years ago in cargo containing lithium batteries and other goods on a United Parcel Service plane, forcing an emergency landing in Philadelphia. No one was killed, but one of the pilots said he was able to escape with seconds to spare. The cause of the fire wasn’t conclusively determined, but batteries were suspected.
Last year, another UPS plane with a fire raging on board, and carrying thousands of lithium batteries, crashed near Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, killing both pilots. The accident is still under investigation, but preliminary reports indicate investigators have focused much of their attention on the batteries.
The use of rechargeable lithium-ion and non-rechargeable lithium-metal batteries has soared since the late 1990s. Millions of products from laptops to cellphones to watches contain the batteries. And, in an age of increasing globalization of trade, those products are often shipped by air to and from the United States and other countries.
But the batteries can catch fire if they are damaged, exposed to high temperatures or packaged incorrectly. Lithium-ion battery fires can reach 1,100 degrees, close to the melting point of aluminum, a key material in airplane construction. Lithium-metal battery fires are far hotter, capable of reaching 4,000 degrees.
The administration proposed regulations that would have threated lithium batteries and goods containing the batteries as hazardous materials requiring special labeling and training of workers who package and handle them.
But they were opposed by a broad swath of powerful industries, including battery-makers, electronics manufacturers and retailers, cargo airlines, and at least a half dozen foreign governments who said they would disrupt international trade. The opponents said the regulations would cost them hundreds of millions of dollars in added packaging, paperwork and employee training. The rechargeable battery industry alone says the rules would cost more than $1 billion in the first year.
Opponents of the proposed rules turned for help to Congress, where House Republicans passed an FAA funding bill that requires the U.S. to follow standards set by the International Civil Aviation Organization, a UN agency, effectively blocking the rules. The Senate did not include the measure in its version of the funding bill, but under the tentative deal reached Friday, the House-Senate compromise bill would include it.
Kara Ross, a spokeswoman for United Parcel Service, said the cargo carrier wasn’t aware of the agreement reached by lawmakers but supports the House provision.
A spokesman for PRBA-The Rechargeable Battery Association declined to comment.
Besides Rahall, the other lawmakers involved in negotiations were Rep. John Mica, chairman of the House committee, Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., and Kay Bailey Hutchison, senior Republican member of the Senate committee.
The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission has come out against the merger of cellphone giant AT&T and T-Mobile USA.
Julius Genachowski made his position known in a document he circulated to fellow commissioners Tuesday.
Genachowski recommended sending AT&T Inc.’s proposed $39 billion takeover of T-Mobile to an administrative law judge for review and a hearing. That’s what the FCC does when it opposes a merger.
According to an FCC official familiar with the matter, an agency analysis concluded the merger would result in higher prices for consumers, less innovation, less investment in the U.S. and fewer U.S. jobs.
The review also cast doubt on AT&T’s claim that only the merger would allow it build out “4G” high-speed wireless Internet access to cover 97 percent of the population, up from about 80 percent. The agency concluded AT&T would likely do so anyway to remain competitive with Verizon Wireless.
The official wasn’t authorized to speak publicly.
AT&T spokesman Larry Solomon said in a statement that the chairman’s action was “disappointing.”
“It is yet another example of a government agency acting to prevent billions in new investment and the creation of many thousands of new jobs at a time when the U.S. economy desperately needs both,” he said. “At this time, we are reviewing all options.”
The FCC would be the second government agency to oppose the deal. The Justice Department filed a lawsuit with the U.S. District Court in Washington in August to stop it, and that trial is expected to start Feb. 13.
Genachowski’s proposed order recommends the administrative law judge begin the hearing after the trial is done.
The deal announced in March would vault the combined No. 2 carrier AT&T and No. 4 T-Mobile into the top spot ahead of Verizon.
Dallas-based AT&T has about 101 million wireless subscribers. T-Mobile, the Bellevue, Wash.-based subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom AG of Germany, has 34 million. Verizon Wireless, a joint venture between Verizon Communications Inc. and Vodafone Group PLC, has about 108 million, while Sprint Nextel Corp. has 53 million.
There was a time not so long ago that seeing a single wind turbine spinning in the distance was a novel experience for most people.
Not so much any more. There are now hundreds of wind turbines scattered across the province, representing 1,700 megawatts of wind capacity in Ontario alone
The U.S. Justice Department expanded an investigatioin into Puerto Rican shipping Thursday, announcing a $14.2 million fine for a Florida-based company and a criminal charge against its former president.
Sea Star Line LLC agreed to the fine and a guilty plea to one felony count of conspiring to fix prices on cargo moving in and out of the U.S. island territory, the Justice Department said in a statement.
A federal grand jury in San Juan indicted the company’s former president and chief operating officer, Frank Peake, on a charge of conspiring to fix prices on Puerto Rico routes from late 2005 until April 2008. Peake, a New Jersey resident, is now a shipping company executive with a company affiliated with Sea Star.
Sea Star, based in Jacksonville, Florida, issued a statement apologizing to its customers, and noted the agreement provides that the Justice Department will not bring criminal charges against its parent companies, Saltchuk Resources Inc. and American Shipping Group Inc.
Sea Star employees engaged in the price-fixing scheme in violation of company policies, but the company is still responsible for the conduct under antitrust law, said Anthony Chiarello, President of American Shipping Group Inc.
“We extend sincere apologies to all of our loyal customers and the consumers who were affected by this conduct,” Chiarello said in the statement. “It was contrary to everything that Sea Star stands for and will not be tolerated in the future.”
He said by email that he was unable to answer questions because he was traveling.
David Oscar Markus, a lawyer for Peake, said his client denies wrongdoing and expressed confidence his client will be cleared of a charge that carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison.
“Frank is innocent. He is never going to do a day in jail because he didn’t do the things they said he did,” said Markus, based in Miami. “It’s a real shame that the government is wasting its resources on something like this.”
Peake is accused of meeting with unidentified others in his industry to allocate customers and set prices for freight services for government and commercial clients, according to the indictment.
As part of the agreement, which is subject to court approval, Sea Star admitted conspiring to set prices and rig bids between May 2002 and April 2008, according to court papers.
Last April, the investigation brought a $15 million fine for Horizon Lines LLC of Charlotte, North Carolina. Five former executives of Sea Star and Horizon have received fines and jail sentences stemming from the probe.
Peabody Energy Corp. said Wednesday that it has increased its stake in Australia’s Macarthur Coal Ltd. beyond 90 percent — the point that it can require other stockholders to tender their shares.
The St. Louis-based coal producer is also raising its offer for Macarthur as previously agreed to do if its stake in the mining company exceeded the 90-percent threshold, bringing the total value of the deal to almost $5 billion.
Peabody will now pay 16.25 Australian dollars for each Macarthur share, a slight bump from its previous offer of 16 Australian dollars bad credit payday advance.
Gregory H. Boyce, Peabody’s chief executive, said acquiring 100-percent of Macarthur “brings clear strategic and financial benefits.”
Peabody “looks forward to completing operational improvements, accelerating the realization of synergies and advancing Macarthur’s growth pipeline,” Boyce said.
Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi has won a much-watched vote in Parliament but it shows he can no longer count on an overall majority in the Chamber of Deputies.
In parliament, 308 voted in favor, 321 abstained and no one voted against.
The opposition immediately demanded that Berlusconi resign to calm financial markets, although he has always refused those calls.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP’s earlier story is below.
ROME (AP) _ Premier Silvio Berlusconi geared up for one of the most critical votes of his long political career Tuesday, as his main ally urged him to resign and Italy’s political uncertainty rocked financial markets for yet another day.
Berlusconi did not immediately respond to the demand, but he has repeatedly resisted all calls for his resignation before his term ends in 2013.
Berlusconi’s government is under intense pressure to enact quick reforms to shore up Italy’s defenses against Europe’s raging debt crisis. However, a weak coalition and doubts over Berlusconi’s leadership have ignited market fears of a looming Italian financial disaster that could bring down the 17-nation eurozone and shock the global economy.
“We asked him to step aside, take a step to the side,” Northern League leader Umberto Bossi told reporters ahead of a key vote in Parliament that could force Berlusconi’s resignation. Bossi is the volatile ally who also brought down Berlusconi’s first conservative government in 1994.
On the face of it, Tuesday’s vote is just a routine measure to approve 2010 state finances, but it has now become a test of Berlusconi’s political strength.
Italy’s center-left opposition said it would abstain in Tuesday’s voting, to make it clear just how fragile Berlusconi’s forces in Parliament are. If he is backed by fewer than 316 deputies _ or less than half of the 630-member chamber _ it would show the prime minister can no longer count on a majority in the lower house of Parliament, even though the government could still mathematically win the vote.
Bossi said the man Berlusconi has already picked as his successor, former Justice Minister Angelino Alfano, should now lead the government.
But it would be up to the Italian president, Giorgio Napolitano, to decide whether to appoint a new leader or dissolve parliament and call early elections. He would likely sound out political leaders before deciding.
Added Bossi: “Today, nothing will happen.”
Italy is the eurozone’s third-largest economy, with debts of around euro1.9 trillion ($2.6 trillion). Representing 17 percent of the eurozone’s gross domestic product, it is considered too big for Europe to bail out like the continent already has done for Greece, Portugal and Ireland.
Even worse, a substantial part of Italy’s debt needs to be rolled over in the next few years _ the nation needs to raise euro300 billion ($412 billion) in 2012 alone _ just as interest rates for it to borrow have been soaring.
Italy’s borrowing rates spiked Tuesday to their highest level since the euro was established in 1999. By mid-afternoon, the yield on Italy’s ten-year bonds was up 0.08 percentage point at 6.62 percent, down from an earlier high of 6.74 percent. A rate of over 7 percent is considered unsustainable and proved to be the trigger point that forced the other three eurozone nations into accepting financial bailouts.
Even the business leaders who once enthusiastically backed the media mogul’s leadership have been upset for months, saying Berlusconi’s government has failed to revive Italy’s stalled economy.
“(Italy) cannot go forward” with the soaring spread. “The country cannot stay in these conditions,” said Emma Marcegaglia, who leads a politically influential Italian business lobby.
The opposition center-left has long demanded the 75-year-old leader’s resignation, citing sex scandals, criminal prosecutions and legislative priorities it says are aimed at protecting his own business interests rather than those of the country. However, it has failed to come up with a leader who can unite the opposition.
Berlusconi appeared to be frantically trying to line up vote after vote, with at least two party dissenters visiting his Rome residence Tuesday as parliament resumed debate ahead of the vote.
One, lawmaker Isabella Bertolini, told reporters upon leaving she would vote in favor of the government. She said Berlusconi had laid out for her “all the possibilities and options that he’s evaluating: Stay, step back, step aside.”
Finance Minister Giulio Tremonti hurriedly left a eurozone finance ministers meeting in Brussels to get back to Rome for the vote.
But at least one deputy from Berlusconi’s People of Freedom Party won’t be there. Lawmaker Alfonso Papa, who is being investigated in a corruption scandal, is under house arrest.
If he gets through Tuesday’s hurdle, Berlusconi has indicated next week’s vote on the austerity measures would be a confidence vote. If it loses that, he would have to resign.
Antonio Di Pietro, a leader of a small center-left opposition party, told Sky TG24 TV that Berlusconi’s “political adventure has been over for a while now.” However, he doubted that Berlusconi would voluntarily leave.
One of Berlusconi’s closest allies, lawmaker Francesco Cicchitto, told reporters that coalition leaders will take stock immediately after the vote.
“One thing at a time. First the vote, let’s let it happen. Then we’ll reflect,” he said.
International financial officials and the markets, meanwhile, fretted over how long it was going to take for Italian lawmakers to approve measures promised weeks ago by Berlusconi to rein in Italy’s galloping public debt.
“I’m not making any judgment on Mr. Berlusconi personally. But I think there is a problem of confidence,” French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe told French radio RTL.
During a G-20 summit last week, Berlusconi had to take the humiliating step of asking the International Monetary Fund to monitor the country’s reform efforts. On Wednesday, a separate European Union monitoring mission is to begin work in Rome to review financial reforms taken so far.
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