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The Honolulu Advertiser

Updated at 1:48 p.m., Monday, June 18, 2007

Business highlights: Yahoo, Enron, Wendy's, Airbus

Associated Press

YAHOO CHAIRMAN ENDS 6-YEAR TENURE AS CEO

SAN FRANCISCO — Yahoo Inc. Chairman Terry Semel ended his six-year tenure as chief executive officer Monday and will hand over the reins to co-founder Jerry Yang in the Internet icon's latest attempt to regain investor confidence.

Semel, 64, will remain chairman in a nonexecutive role.

Besides naming Yang as its new CEO, Yahoo appointed Susan Decker as its president. Decker, who had been recently promoted to oversee Yahoo's advertising operations, had widely been seen as Semel's heir apparent.

The Sunnyvale-based company announced the shake-up less than a week after Semel faced off with shareholders disillusioned with Yahoo's lackluster performance during the past 18 months — a malaise that wasn't reflected in Semel's compensation.

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OIL CLOSES ABOVE $69 A BARREL

NEW YORK — Oil closed above $69 a barrel, a nine-month high, and gasoline futures also rose Monday after Nigerian oil unions called a strike for this week.

Retail gas prices, meanwhile, continued their decline despite analyst predictions Friday that they would fall no further.

Nigerian oil unions called a general nationwide strike to begin Wednesday in protest of a government price hike on automobile fuel. Also supporting energy prices were attacks on two Nigerian oil facilities by angry villagers and gunmen, which cut oil output.

Nigeria was the third-biggest exporter of oil to the U.S. in March, behind Canada and Mexico, with an average of 1.35 million barrels a day, according to Energy Department statistics.

Light, sweet crude for July delivery rose $1.09 to settle at $69.09 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The front-month contract last closed above $69 on Sept. 1.

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SUPREME COURT SIDES WITH WALL STREET BANKS

WASHINGTON — Investors who lost money when the dot-com bubble burst suffered a Supreme Court setback Monday, and the justices are poised to issue yet another important decision that could restrict shareholder lawsuits.

The court sided with Wall Street banks that were alleged to have conspired to drive up prices on about 900 newly issued stocks in the late 1990s.

The justices reversed a federal appeals court decision that would have enabled investors to pursue their case for anticompetitive practices.

The outcome of the antitrust case was vital to Wall Street because damages in antitrust cases are tripled, in contrast to penalties under the securities laws.

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EX-ENRON EXEC GETS 27-MONTH SENTENCE

HOUSTON — One of the key prosecution witnesses whose testimony helped convict former Enron CEO Jeffrey Skilling and company founder Kenneth Lay was sentenced Monday to 27 months in prison.

It's been nearly three years since Kenneth Rice, 48, the former chief of Enron Corp.'s high-speed Internet unit, pleaded guilty to securities fraud and agreed to help federal prosecutors on other cases related to the energy giant's collapse. His sentencing was postponed as he cooperated with prosecutors.

Rice becomes the ninth ex-Enron executive to receive a jail term after pleading guilty to crimes.

Before sentencing, Rice apologized for his role in the corporate scandal that wiped out thousands of jobs, more than $60 billion in market value and more than $2 billion in pension plans.

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WENDY'S EXPLORING POSSIBLE SALE

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Wendy's International Inc. is exploring a possible sale of the company, the nation's third-largest hamburger chain said Monday, as it warned that profits for the year would fall short of Wall Street expectations.

The company, under pressure from shareholders, formed a committee in April to determine how to boost its stock price, including a possible sale. JP Morgan, as lead adviser, and Lehman Brothers Inc., as co-adviser, will conduct a review in conjunction with the committee.

A sale would cap a whirlwind year for the company, which has spun off its Tim Hortons coffee-and-doughnut chain, dumped its money-losing Baja Fresh Mexican Grill and laid off employees at its corporate office.

The company said there is no assurance that a deal will be completed.

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AIRBUS OPENS AIR SHOW WITH SERIES OF ORDERS

LE BOURGET, France — Airbus racked up a series of big orders at the opening Monday of the world's biggest air show, stealing some early limelight from U.S. rival Boeing Co.

With the manufacturers' intense competition again expected to be a dominant theme of the weeklong show at Le Bourget, north of Paris, both looked to make a splash from the get-go, with billions of dollars worth of orders announced.

Airbus booked orders from US Airways, Qatar Airlines, Emirates, Jazeera Airways and Nouvelair for a raft of planes, including its problem-plagued A350 and superjumbo A380 models.

Airbus sales chief John Leahy predicted Monday that the planemaker will land more than 280 orders over the week — airplane manufacturers often reserve big announcements for the show to ensure maximum impact.

At the last Le Bourget show in 2005, Airbus announced orders worth $33.5 billion, double Boeing's $15 billion, based on list prices — which are usually discounted for the deals.

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CHRYSLER PUSHING FOR HEALTHCARE CONCESSIONS

DETROIT — Chrysler may get the same healthcare concessions from the United Auto Workers that its Detroit-based competitors received two years ago.

Union President Ron Gettelfinger said Monday that the UAW must find a way to give Chrysler a similar deal to what it gave Ford Motor Co. and General Motors Corp. in 2005.

Chrysler's parent, Germany's DaimlerChrysler AG, announced last month that it would sell a controlling stake of its ailing U.S. operations to private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management LP. Analysts have said Cerberus likely will demand deeper concessions from the union than Daimler would have.

The UAW in 2005 gave healthcare concessions to Ford and GM that saved the companies billions of dollars, but refused to do the same for Chrysler because of its stronger financial condition at the time.

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FINISH LINE TO PAY $1.5B FOR GENESCO

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Speciality retailer Finish Line Inc. said Monday it agreed to pay about $1.5 billion for footwear and accessories retailer Genesco Inc., which recently rejected a lower offer from Foot Locker Inc.

Genesco shares rose more than 8 percent on news of the deal.

Finish Line, a leading mall-based retailer based in Indianapolis, said combined sales of the companies amount to about $2.8 billion from 2,870 retail stores in the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico.

Finish Line agreed to pay $54.50 per share, or about 6.8 percent higher than the $51 per share price offered two weeks ago by Foot Locker. The Finish Line offer marks a premium of 9.8 percent over Genesco's closing price of on Friday.

Genesco previously rejected the Foot Locker bid, saying it was not in the best interest of shareholders. The company had been reviewing alternatives to increase its stock price. It has about 27.5 million fully-diluted shares outstanding.