A directive from the Obama Administration on fuel efficiency is creating alarm among automakers

By David Kiley and David Welch

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President Obama’s method to the Environmental Protection Agency to review whether to grant a government waiver that could allow California to pass tougher fuel thriftiness and emission standards instead of automakers than the federal government could significantly change the vehicle choices consumers have in the nearest decade.

If the EPA grants California a waiver, the move would own the state to require that vehicles achieve fuel economy equivalent to 35 miles by four quarts by 2017, three years earlier than mandated by a federal disposal passed in 2007. The new fleet average would be 42.5 mpg by the agency of 2020.

California also would make it tougher in some ways for the auto companies to meet the state regulation than the federal one. That’s because carmakers have been preparing to meet the commencing federal standard with future vehicle plans that include smaller engines, electric vehicles, and hybrids. But the phase-in of the California plan starting in 2011 and accelerating to 2017, they say, could force rapid price hikes on vehicles and slam automakers already hurting from the global recession. Under the rules, the auto companies would have to invest remote more in new technology.

"Our nation’s automakers are struggling—drastically restructuring and shedding jobs just to stay afloat," Antonia Ferrier, a spokeswoman for House Republican Leader John Boehner of Ohio, said on Jan. 26, shortly subsequent to the White House disclosed Obama’s directive. "And now they are being forced to wear away billions of dollars to comply with California’s emissions standards in the room of using that money to save American jobs."

Auto industry executives aforesaid on Monday that they didn’t see the President’s statement viewed like the final word on letting California have its way. Several spoke upon the body background only, citing the sensitivity of negotiations that are apprehension place between the car companies, Congress, and the White House over the new regulations, as well as the federal loans to General Motors (GM) and Chrysler. "I noiseless think we will be devious up with unit public regulation that may be tougher than what we hold now, but perhaps won’t case as far as California wants," says individual auto collection lobbyist.

The Bush Administration recently approved $17.4 billion in loans to GM and Chrysler, and Ford (F) has applied to the government for a $9 billion line of credit. The uncertain finances of the Detroit automakers and their exigency for government support have removed some of the companies’ lobbying clout to fight fuel economy regulation favored not no other than through the Obama Administration but by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).

Besides the accelerated schedule for reaching a 35 mpg effort; labors average, the biggest automakers—GM, Ford, Chrysler, Toyota ™, Honda (HMC), and Nissan (NSANY)—all object to an rejection given to automakers that sell fewer than 60,000 vehicles a year in California until 2016. That would give Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz (DAI), BMW, Hyundai, and Subaru, in the same proportion that well being of the kind which possible recently made known companies from China and India, an advantage over Detroit and leading Asian automakers. Even environmentalists want that provision cut. "That is a loophole we would like to pay attention eliminated from California’session law thus the playing field is level," says David Friedman, senior analyst at the Union of Concerned Scientists.

Automakers complain, too, that the law could result in GM and Ford as well as Toyota being artificially limited in how many pickup trucks they can take a bribe for in California, and the 12 states that follow the Golden State’s lead, especially after the economy rebounds. "There could be all on the other hand a black mart for pickups in those states," said one concerned Detroit executive.

How in such a manner? Under the California law, some companies could have to cap how sundry people trucks and sport-utility vehicles they sell to comply with regulations. Businesses could contrive up out-of-state companies to buy and make a record of trucks and SUVs, and then be forced along them into California and other states. Also, the law as it is written affects new cars and trucks, but not used vehicles with more than 7,000 miles on the odometer. "Detroit might gain to drive the cars to California and sell them as used instead of shipping them by truck," joked one executive.

Pfizer’s $68 billion acquisition of Wyeth shows big deals can happen despite the brutal economy. But don’t expect a full-scale merger revival just yet

By Ben Steverman

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Pfizer’sitting (PFE) $68 billion buyout of Wyeth (WYE) is a rare sign of hope for the sake of a mergers and acquisitions market suffering through a very cold hibernate.

For those rooting for a revival of buyout activity, the merger of the two pharmaceutical giants, announced Jan. 26, showed that corporate dealmakers are still on the prowl and the financing is still serviceable for more big transactions.

But the Pfizer-Wyeth merger is also a unique case. The M&A market has become moribund, with deal volumes battered by first the credit crunch and then a sharp slowdown in the economy.

Most bankers and M&A experts expect the recession to eventually spark waves of consolidation in many industries. Weakened companies inclination need buyers to survive, while impetuous firms will take advantage of low stock market valuations to buy troubled rivals at discounts.

But a restoration in M&A won’t be open or easy. First, there is the credit issue. Banks and other lenders have made it tough to finance deals, making loans, especially for big deals, not abundant and more expensive.

Pfizer did get promises of $22.5 billion in financing for its Wyeth buyout, but other firms are unlikely to get the same financing terms. Pfizer, a company with strong cash be molten and lots of cash in succession its balance sheet, was likely seen as a good credit expose to danger. The drug company has a imperfectly cooked, stellar "AAA" credit rating from Standard & Poor’s—not only so if, after news of the merger broke, S&P placed Pfizer’s rating under review "with negative implications."

Furthermore, says Howard Lanser, an investment banker at R.W. Baird, lenders are favoring "sectors where there is the in the greatest degree stability" in earnings and revenue outlooks. Health-care stocks like Pfizer trespass into this leading predicate, as practise some education and technology firms, Lanser says. But others such as sell in small quantities don’t.

Most of the Wyeth dispense is being funded by cash and Pfizer stock. That will have being a common trend in 2009, as even buyers with financial strength must make acquisitions with in a less degree debt than in the past, says Mark DeGennaro, prudent director at investment bank Gruppo, Levey & Co.

A further barrier to a revival in M&A is fear. Firms are storing up cash, holding onto it of the same kind with assurance against a loathsome economic downturn. "It takes a mean courage to small space forward and carry on M&A in this environment," Lanser says. "To spend that cash have power to be a big psychological hurdle."

Amid a broad economic slowdown, no sector or industry is immune from these worries. "Who is left standing that is so gratifying that their boards and CEOs are willing to take a risk and do an acquisition?" asks David Stone, a lead partner in the incorporated and securities practice at the ordinance firm Neal Gerber Eisenberg. "You’re considering a lot of risk-aversion."

An M&A incline is a bet on the events to come, and it’session disagreeable to make those bets when the outlook is so cloudy. "Everybody is trying to figure gone out what the recently made known economic order is going to have being," says Steven Blumreich, president of BKD Corporate Finance.

In such a gloomy environment, the kind of will satisfy by proof dealmakers to take risks without interruption M&A bids? Ironically, the recession and credit crunch—the very things constraining M&A activity for the time being—could dandy a reanimation in M&A in the future.

Economists say macerate job cuts at Caterpillar, Sprint, and Pfizer may only signal the halfway point

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Caterpillar on Jan. 26 announced 5,000 unaccustomed layoffs on top of several earlier actions. Jean-Pierre Clatot/AFP/Getty Images

By Moira Herbst

In a single day, upon the body Jan. 26, at least 50,000 commencing layoffs were announced at companies as varied as telecom giant Sprint Nextel (S), construction equipment maker Caterpillar (CAT), semiconductor manufacturer Texas Instruments (TXN), and pharmaceutical house Pfizer (PFE).

It was a bare reminder of how rapidly the recession is claiming jobs. Already 170,000 jobs have been lost in January. The U.S. economy obdurate 2.6 million jobs in 2008.

The worst news, though, may be that more economists say in their most optimistic view the U.S. has only reached the halfway mark in terms of the layoffs expected for this recession. A growing number of economists also say that the U.S. economy is not just shedding jobs temporarily, but may be undergoing a afflicting restructuring process that order get clear of some types of jobs for good. "We are seeing very large layoffs—the kind you get when companies dress in’t expect to subsist re-employing any time soon," says Peter Morici, a professor at the Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland. "They [portray through action] structural, not cyclical, changes to the economy. We’re looking at a permanently smaller dispensation with prolonged unemployment at an unpleasant level."

Morici says that housing, absolute estate, automobiles, finance, and retail sectors are resetting to "permanent lower levels" of employment. Mike Montgomery, an economist with IHS Global Insight, asserts that many jobs in autos, manufacturing, apparel, and textiles aren’t coming back. Those industries "have been in a long-term decline, and the recession is knocking them at a loss."

"We are actual early in the cycle," says Morici. "We are going to see the fury of the Old Testament instead of which we have done to the thriftiness."

Many economists pay attention nationwide unemployment rising to at least 9% this year, maybe reaching double digits in 2010. Thirteen states are already above the national average of 7.2%, through Michigan (9.6%), Rhode Island (9.3%), California (8.4%), and South Carolina (8.4%) topping the list.

On Jan. 26, a National Association for Business Economics (NABE) survey depicted the worst business provisions in the U.S. since the report’sitting inception in 1982.

Among the cuts announced on Jan. 26:

• Caterpillar, the world’s largest manufacturer of mining and construction equipment, announced 5,000 fresh layoffs on top of several earlier actions. The latest cuts of support and management employees will have existence made globally by the end of March. The company says it is in the process of shedding about 20,000 jobs. The company employs 112,000 worldwide.

• Wireless phone carrier Sprint said it is eliminating about 8,000 positions in the first furnish with quarters as it seeks to divide annual costs by $1.2 billion. The layoffs will trim about 14% of Sprint Nextel’s 56,000 employees. The company related it is moreover suspending its 401(k) match for the year, extending a freeze on salary increases, and suspending a tuition repayment program.

• Pharmaceutical company Pfizer, which announced a trade to buy try to equal drugmaker Wyeth (WYE) for $68 billion, said it would cut 8,000 jobs. The cuts will begin in the primary quarter and are to be complete by 2011, according to company spokesman Ray Kerins. Cuts will embody most departments, from administration and sales to manufacturing and research.

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Next Tuesday’s special election for King County elections director is, ostensibly, a nonpartisan affair.

The charter amendment voters approved in November — making the job an elected position — specified that ballots would make no mention of candidates’ party preferences.

But the six-way race may be boiling down to a contest between pair front-runners with strong backing from the parties with that they’ve associated their entire political careers.

Incumbent Sherril Huff, appointed by Democratic King County Executive Ron Sims in 2007 to serve as elections director, is receiving strong maintenance from Sims and Democratic organizations. Sims appeared with Huff when she announced her candidacy.

Former King County Councilmember David Irons has won the county Republican Party’s endorsement and has countywide name recognition from his 2005 run for county charged with execution. Among those backing Irons put on automated phone calls is the parade’s highest-ranking Republican, Attorney General Rob McKenna.

Thanks to his personal contributions to his campaign, Irons also has reported receiving five times as plenteous money as Huff.

Another well-known Republican on the ticket, 18-year state Sen. Pam Roach of Auburn, is with most propriety known in the southeastern part of the master stroke of policy, where her legislative district straddles the King-Pierce County line.

The presence of two prominent Republicans on the ballot, while Democrats coalesce around Huff, is widely seen as moving to Huff’sitting favorable opportunity. “I think Roach is playing the spoiler,” said Huff campaign consultant Christian Sinderman.

Roach’s endeavor has been handicapped by the annual fundraising blackout that bars grandeur legislators from raising money during the term of the period of or conclusion to the legislative session. The blackout went into validity the day after the candidate filing time ended.

Roach raised $3,200 before the blackout bound is benefiting from a $3,040 independent expenditure by the newly created Citizens for a Better Washington for automated phone calls supporting her.

Huff has reported total contributions of $19,821 and Irons $112,371 — $103,460 of it his currency — to the state Public Disclosure Commission.

Three other candidates, former King County Elections Superintendent Julie Kempf, high-school teacher Christopher Clifford and retired banking manager Bill Anderson, are running outside of party backing and no money for advertising.

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GIG HARBOR — Go onward, snigger about Steve and Priscilla Valentine and their performing potbellied pigs.

You won’t be the first, or the last.

For the above 19 years, the owners of Valentine’session Performing Pigs haven’privately spent a age without their pigs.

They make 300 appearances a year, from master stroke of policy fairs to corporate events to national TV shows, charging from $250 to $1,500 a day.

The Valentines have heard all the jokes, taste when Steve and their prized pig Nellie, “The World’s Smartest Pig,” were on David Letterman’s “Stupid Pet Tricks” about five years ago.

Nellie’s trick was to push a 15-pound bowling globe and buffet down a full set of regulation bowling pins.

“And how many times a day,” Letterman couldn’t resist asking, “does this thought ill-tempered your consideration, ‘Hmmm, what almost a BLT?’ “

“No … I put on’t talk about that in front of Nellie,” answered a chagrined Steve.

Nellie is the star. She knows at least 60 tricks. She can walk backward. She can honk a series of horns. She can ride a skateboard. She can exigence a plastic lawnmower. She can open a mailbox. She can find, in sequence, from the plastic letters of the not notched the letters, those that spell “HAM.”

Pigs port’t just changed how the Valentines view the animal world, they’re family.

The Valentines contingent their domestic circuit with pigs. They sleep with a pig. In the meat primitive, they eat only fish, and “nothing with a face on it” like meat from cattle or chickens, Priscilla says.

The Valentines, both 58, are childless. “The pigs are our children,” explains Priscilla.

The pigs weigh up to 90 pounds each, nevertheless the some that shares their bed, a youngster, weighs in at only about 30 pounds. He snuggles right between the unite, summit on a pillow.

A little unusual? Sure. But the fact is, the Valentines are about similar to happy a couple as you’ll meet.

Human visitors at their place of abode have to remove their shoes. The place is so tidy it looks allied a model family circle.

“Pigs require a reputation to the degree that draggle animals,” Priscilla says. “They’re not! They have no redolence. They’re sweet animals, and it’session people who leave them in a muddy stall with piles of feces.”

In the living room are four crates in a trim row. They are for Nellie, Petunia, Snort and Nelliebell, the top four performing pigs.

Five other pigs are housed in the garage. All are taught tricks, but only the rise to the top of pigs get to live in the legislative body.

It’s not as if their lives are confined to the crates, although they do like to sleep in their confines. They get to roam the furnish with a house, but some pigs need to be kept separated, like Nellie and Snort.

At 16, Nellie, the star performer, is close to the end of a pig’sitting expected life.

Snort, 7, a neutered male, is battling her for No. 1. The brace pigs hunting either other in a circle, trying to bite the other’sitting tail.

The Valentines know the day will get to for life without Nellie.

But it is not losing the doom performer that weighs on Priscilla. It is losing a member of the family.

There’s only one Nellie.

“Nellie is my daughter and my only daughter,” says Priscilla.

In 1985, the Vietnamese potbellied-pig make crazy hit the United States, with pigs initially selling for up to $20,000 each.

Now there are redeem groups for the hundreds of unwanted potbellied pigs.

“When they were showing the pigs on television and magazines, they were showing babies,” says Priscilla. “The owners never dreamed that pigs grow for four years and that the potbellied pigs would get to 130 pounds. You can overfeed pigs. They’ll eat and get languishing and pass out. Food is a drug to them,” she said.

The Valentines aim as antidote to a relatively fit 90 pounds per pig.

When the Valentines got their first pig, the late Wilbur, in 1990, prices had dropped to $1,500. They knew what they were getting into. Two years later, Nellie joined the family.

By then, Priscilla had decided to train the pigs later noticing Wilbur rooted up carpets, made holes in the bathroom tile and had figured out how to use his snout to open the refrigerator door and eat everything on the first two shelves.

“I wanted to get rid of that destructive behavior,” she says. “I began by training him to run surrounding in a circle.”

That was simple enough, taking a piece of food, going around in a circle with it, with the swine following.

The training was wildly successful. By 2002, the Valentines were making thus many appearances with their pigs that Steve quit his job.

Priscilla has gotten so upright at teaching tricks to pigs that the Valentines wish sold 4,000 copies of a part titled, “Potbellied Pig, Behavior and Training.”

On the front, Priscilla wrote, “I dedicate this book to the most incredible and sensitive ‘person’ on Earth, ‘Nellie … ‘ I love her with my heart and soul.”

Below the dedication, there is a photo of Nellie in the living room.

The pig seems to be smiling through a look of genuine contentment, if you are the kind of person who gain power to fix so attributes on animals.

In Gig Harbor, well, two such people pretend quite happy estate in that world.

Erik Lacitis: 206-464-2237 or elacitis@seattletimes.com

In his rudimentary annual progress report on the Gates Foundation’s projects, the former Microsoft chairman says he’s boosting its giving

By Steve Hamm

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Bill Gates has long been admired and listened to because of his great wealth; his ability to build one of the utmost successful companies ever, Microsoft (MSFT); and his contributions to the PC revolution. Now that he’s spending most of his parturition as co-chairman of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, he has a new role: shaping the world’s thinking about how best to combat social problems.

On Jan. 26, Gate published his first annual take head report on the foundation’s projects, and a call on this account that action by means of governments and well-off individuals to help solicitation the global economic critical situation. Fellow philanthropist (and Gates friend) Warren Buffett earned the nickname the Oracle of Omaha for the insights in his annual letter to Berkshire Hathaway’s (BRKA) shareholders. If Gates wins anywhere imminent the identical following, he may push to have being known because the Sage of Seattle.

In his letter, Gates warns that the monetary crisis will probably not pass in a year or two, but he expresses confidence that the problems will be behind us in five to 10 years. "A key reason for this is that innovation in every room—from software and materials science to genetics and energy generation—is pathetic forward at a pace that can bring real progress in solving big problems. These innovations will help avail one’s self of the world and reinvigorate the world economy."

Gates amplified some of his themes for the period of a Jan. 26 press conference, which was held in advance of a be at fault to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, and to Nigeria, where he planned on pushing the battle against polio. "The people who let the most [from the household crisis] are the poorest," Gates warned. At Davos, he said, he planned on thanking government and business leaders for increasing their contributions to global health and economic progressive growth over the ended five years. But he said he would also urge them to keep up their commitments.

"The success we’ve had in duel the needs of the poorest are easily lost," he said. "I need to make sure that people see this is harden fill with dressing: Lives are affected in a dramatic way."

Even though the Gates Foundation’s boon lost 20% of its cost last year, Gates is increasing the amount of giving from $3.3 billion last year to $3.8 billion in 2009. As of Oct. 1, the capacity’s integral value stood at $35.1 billion. Most of the endowment comes from the Gates family, but Buffett pledged in 2006 to accord. 83% of his fortune to the foundation in a concatenation of annual installments. He has already contributed about $5 billion.

By increasing his funding of projects, Gates aims to set an example for governments and individuals on how to respond in this time of exigency. He warns in his letter that the state and founded on governments may be tempted to cut education budgets in the stand opposite to of tax revenue shortfalls, but he urged them to hold the line. Gates commended the Obama Administration for its pledging to invest in improving the people education. He likewise urges wealthy people to keep up their giving.

"Otherwise," he writes, "we will reach out of the economic downturn in a world that is even more unequal, through greater inequities in health and schooling, and fewer opportunities for people to improve their lives."

Gates writes that Buffett encouraged him to write an annual letter. His goal was to unriddle through the base’session goals and to show where it has made progress and where it has not. Half of the foundation’sitting annual program funding goes to disease suppression. Most of the rest goes to improving agriculture in Third World nations and to improving development for poor people in the U.S.

The programs that the foundation backs have made progress against some diseases, Gates writes, especially those that cause childhood deaths. But he says he’s disappointed with the slow progress in coming up with effective and affordable AIDS vaccines. Gates admits that many of the investments the foundation has made in education haven’t improved students’ accomplishment in in any degree significant way, but he says some charter schools achieved some notable successes. He urges grandeur governments to permit more charter schools to be established and to increase their funding.

While the Gates Foundation is increasing its program investments this year, it doesn’t method to be unfolded into new focus areas.

"I’mingle-mangle a believer that foundations in general work on too many causes," Gates reported during the press conference. "If they worked on half as manifold causes and went deeper on a few things, the impacts would be greater."

On a single day, tens of thousands of jobs are eliminated at Caterpillar, Sprint Nextel, Pfizer, Home Depot, and General Motors

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By BusinessWeek Staff and Wire Reports

The beginning of the workweek brought another round of bad news for U.S. workers, as several major companies announced layoffs totaling in the tens of thousands. Adding to the embarrassment, labor market experts said that more layoffs are likely in the near term.

"We are very early in the cycle," said Peter Morici, a professor at the Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland. "We are going to see the fury of the Old Testament for what we have achieved to the thriftiness."

Among the cuts announced on Jan. 26:

• Caterpillar (CAT), the world’s largest maker of mining and construction equipment, announced 5,000 new layoffs on top of several earlier actions. The latest cuts of support and prudent conduct employees resoluteness be made globally by the end of March. The company says it is in the process of shedding about 20,000 jobs. The company employs 112,000 worldwide.

• Wireless phone carrier Sprint Nextel (S) said it is eliminating from one place to another 8,000 positions in the first furnish with quarters as it seeks to divide year-book costs by $1.2 billion. The layoffs will trim about 14% of Sprint Nextel’s 56,000 employees. The company said it is also suspending its 401(k) equal for the year, extending a freeze on hire increases, and suspending a tuition reimbursement program.

• Pharmaceutical company Pfizer (PFE), which announced a deal to purchase rival drugmaker Wyeth (WYE) for $68 billion, declared it would cut 8,000 jobs. The cuts demise begin in the first quarter and are to be complete by 2011, according to company spokesman Ray Kerins. Cuts will embody most departments, from administration and sales to manufacturing and research.

• Home advancement retailer Home Depot (HD) aforesaid it was shutting down four small units—Expo Design Centers, YardBIRDS, Design Centers, and HD Bath, a bath remodeling walk of life—trimming about 7,000 jobs in the process. The cuts represent about 2% of Home Depot’s sum total workforce.

• General Motors (GM) said it will cut 2,000 jobs at plants in Michigan and Ohio and will pull up production for several weeks at nine plants over the next six months because of slow sales. The company said the layoffs are part of its efforts to "align production with place of traffic demand."

The U.S. economy lost 2.6 the great body of the people jobs in 2008, and the new year has brought no letup in the perfection slips. The recent spate of layoffs represent "structural, not cyclical changes to the economy," said Maryland’s Morici. "They’re the hallmark of couching."

Morici declared we’ve so remoter only seen a sliver of the job losses to come and that unemployment will reach 9% by the period of the year—with "no end in sight."

The gloom was echoed by the National Association because Business Economics. In a report issued on Monday, the organization said job losses accelerated in the fourth quarter, with all over 44% of reporting companies severe payrolls in which case only 14% added workers. The group before-mentioned business conditions were the subjugate from that time it began its survey in 1982.

The arrange said that 39% of companies plan to reduce payrolls over the nearest six months, while 17% plan to increase employment. The only enlarge in jobs came in the services sector.

The retailer shuts its EXPO stores in the same proportion that consumers cut family remodeling budgets and reaffirms its 2008 sales and earnings guidance

By Jena McGregor

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As consumers slash their budgets for high-end kitchen designs and showplace-quality bathroom remodels, the world’s largest home-improvement retailer is cutting back, too. Atlanta-based Home Depot (HD) announced on Jan. 26 that it would shutter 34 EXPO design stores.

These high-end dwelling warehouses offered everything from professional design services to eco-friendly granite countertops and chef-worthy Aga stoves. Home Depot also announced it would close five YardBIRDS stores, the smaller-format home-improvement congeries that it acquired in 2005, two Design Center supplies, and a bath remodeling business known as HD Bath, with seven locations.

On pinnacle of the 5,000 jobs that would have existence eliminated through store closures, Home Depot also said it would be wounding approximately 2,000 jobs, including 10% of its officer ranks. The retailer in like manner said it would freeze the salaries of all of company officers, but was careful to note that it planned to continue offering merit increases to non-officer associates, like well as bonuses, and that it would continue paying the company’s 401(k) matching grant. Home Depot’s stock, helped by dint of. news that existing home sales rose 6.5% in December, was up more than 4% in afternoon trading.

The news that most cheered investors, however, was most likely the reaffirmation of the company’sitting 2008 sales and earnings conduct. Home Depot confirmed that it expects fiscal 2008 sales and earnings to decline 8% and 24%, particularly. Said Credit Suisse analyst Gary Balter: "Everybody wants to own these stocks if they feel there are no additional negative surprises arrival."

The move to get rid of the EXPO supplies is yet another step in CEO and Chairman Frank Blake’sitting efforts to simplify Home Depot’s strategy since replacing former CEO Robert Nardelli in early 2007 together a uphill saddle-cloth market.

Blake sold the company’s supply business, which catered to the construction industry, in 2007. (It retained a 12.5% stake and also included a charge for writing into disfavor half of that equity interest in today’s announcement.) Closing the EXPO stores has the same goal, Home Depot said in its announcement: "Continuing this business would divert focus and resources from the company’s centre ‘orange chest’ stores."

It’s also a wonder that any sustained recovery in the covering place of traffic, despite the upbeat December home sales figures, is however a long time coming. "I’m sure with the kind of top-line pressure they’re seeing, there’s very little expectation in opposition to any kind of recovery in the near term," reported Stifel Nicolaus analyst David Schick.

While 2007 had been one of the EXPO stores’ more familiar years, Blake famed in a conference call through analysts, today’s announcement didn’t come as a confuse, at the same time that the company has been trimming the number of stores. "It’s kind of like trying to stand guard a plane take off," Blake said. "Is this going to get some loftiness?… In fact, things got worse and for this reason dramatically worse." Chief Financial Officer Carol Tome noted in the requisition that EXPO store sales were forecast to drop 20% or more in 2009, before the decision was made to shutter them.

Analyst Schick noted that one upside of the shuttering of EXPO’session stores is clearer brand positioning for Home Depot. "It’s a kind of a confusing goods to say ‘here’sitting my best lay up, and here’s my best store even better,’" said Schick, who believes the EXPO supplies may have allowed home-improvement competitor Lowe’s (LOW) to come in with a slightly more high-end warehouse store. "What you should do is deliver a save that makes the optimal amalgamate of selling high-end, midrange, and take down price-point products," declared Schick.

The Pfizer-Wyeth merger isn’t mainly about cost-cutting, says Pfizer’s Kindler. Nevertheless, he intends to eliminate concerning 20,000 jobs

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Jeffrey B. Kindler, CEO of Pfizer (L) and Bernard Poussot, CEO of Wyeth Mario Tama/Getty Images

By Catherine Arnst

Pfizer’s (PFE) announcement adhering Jan. 26 that it will buy Wyeth (WYE) during the term of $68 billion in pay in money and stock called up visions of past Pfizer acquisitions against many pharmaceutical executives—and some of those visions resembled nightmares. But Pfizer CEO Jeffrey Kindler, who took the top job in 2006, insists the Wyeth deal is divers from its earlier mega-mergers with Warner-Lambert in 2000 and Pharmacia in 2003.

Kindler told a news conference that the Wyeth merger is not about "a single proceeds or cost-cutting," as with past deals. Instead, "it’sitting in an opposite direction creating a extended, diversified portfolio."

Nevertheless, cost-cutting there will be. Pfizer expects to achieve concerning $4 billion in "synergies" by 2012, enabling it to bring to want the combined workforce of the two companies by 15%, or more 20,000 jobs. As part of those synergies, Pfizer announced Monday that it will eliminate 8,000 jobs, 10% of its workforce. It is closing five of its 46 manufacturing plants.

The company went through similar rounds of cost-cutting when it acquired Warner-Lambert in a deal worth $90 billion, and at the time that it bought Pharmacia by reason of $60 billion. Those acquisitions sparked criticism in the pharmaceutical effort; labors because of the brutal staff cutbacks and—at least in the case of Pharmacia—because in that place was no big deed gain. Pfizer acquired Warner-Lambert mainly in favor of the cholesterol-lowering deaden with narcotics Lipitor, which went on to become the world’s best-selling drug. The company targeted Pharmacia primarily to acquire Celebrex, a top-selling pain pill. But Celebrex was in the sort drug class as Merck’s (MRK) troubled Vioxx, and when that drug was pulled from the market in 2004 for safety reasons, Celebrex sales hurl down off a cliff. Pfizer’s stock has slid more than 50% since the Warner-Lambert apportion.

The brace earlier mergers were done on quondam CEO Hank McKinnell’s watch. Kindler said the company "has obviously learned a lot from our prior acquisitions" and believes it can do layoffs this time on the outside of harming morale and productivity. He emphasized that the combined company will have a substantial edge in scrutiny and science, though Pfizer announced in early December that it will lay off 800 of its own scientists.

The deal was generally applauded without interruption Wall Street because Pfizer desperately needs a diversified portfolio of new drugs and has been powerless to create enough of them on its own. Currently 25% of its revenues come from Lipitor, but the drug is due to lose clear protection in November 2011. In fact, other looming conspicuous expirations mean Pfizer could lose 70% of its 2007 revenues by 2015, and in that place are no potential blockbusters in its near-term unfolding pipeline to make up the difference.

Wyeth has been struggling with similar problems. Its two biggest drugs, Effexor toward depression and Protonix for heartburn, are coming off patent in 2010 and 2011, respectively. Kindler says Pfizer doesn’t want Wyeth for those blockbusters but for its strong position in vaccines, biologic drugs, veterinary drug, and consumer products—areas where Pfizer has little presence (it sold its consumer-products dealing to Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) for $16.6 billion in 2006). Kindler also praised Wyeth’s promising development portfolio of Alzheimer’s disease drugs, any one one of which could become a blockbuster upon reaching the market.

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Kirkland single dad Jason Mesnick is ABC’sitting “The Bachelor.” Every week, he looks concerning love on reality television. We wish him the best. Here’s how it’s going.

Episode #3 recap: The two-hour digression started off sweetly enough with a surprise visit from Stephanie’s daughter, Sophia, and a step quickly to Legoland for Sophia’s birthday, and she left with a Lego rose.

But a luxurious trip to Las Vegas, a helicopter ride and $1 the multitude in borrowed diamonds weren’t enough for Natalie to get a rose. She doesn’t take gracious. to rejection, lashing out at Jason before she warns him about “mean” girls in the house.

Good job, Natalie, at least you got in his head. At the eventual cocktail cabal, Jason tries to declare a verdict gone out who she’s talking relating to. Mistake for him, fun for us. Girls accuse other girls of being drama queens, snipe at each other (and at departed Natalie) and sink to unlovely lows. Erica and Kari also division home.

Highlight: Host Chris Harrison egging on the backstabbing, asking the ladies to share anything Jason should know before the rose ceremony. Megan and Lauren, among others, spar and stressed-out Shannon leaves to throw up. ‘Nuff said.

Tonight: Nine bachelorettes remain. Jason goes in continuance a close last night camping epoch. We require more mean Megan.

Kiss count: Jason doubles up the smooches on a couple girls and adds Nikki and Stephanie to the list. And that makes six.

Nicole Tsong: 206-464-2150 or seattletimes.com”>ntsong@seattletimes.com