The market contended as well with a resurgence of tensions between the U.S. and Iran.

Investors have grown more optimistic about a rate cut at the Fed's Jan. 29-30 meeting after last week's disappointing reports on jobs and manufacturing pointed to a slowing in the economy during December.

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SEATTLE — Starbucks Corp. said Monday it is bringing its chairman and former chief executive, Howard Schultz, back to lead a major restructuring initiative, replacing CEO Jim Donald.

Starbucks said the leadership shuffle is part of a series of initiatives to increase shareholder value, which also include closing underperforming U.S. stores and slowing the pace of store openings.

The company said it plans to take some of the capital originally intended for U.S. store growth and use it to accelerate its international expansion.

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RICHMOND, Va. — Electronics retailer Circuit City Stores Inc. on Monday said same-store sells fell 11.4 percent in December, as strength in the last two weeks of the month was not enough to offset declining sales of tube televisions, camcorders and other devices earlier in December.

Based on its sales results, the company continued to back its forecast of a "modest loss" before taxes for the fourth quarter, despite America's traditional holiday hunger for televisions and other high-tech gadgets.

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LOS ANGELES — Striking Hollywood writers have reached a deal with Tom Cruise's production outfit United Artists Films to resume working while the strike continues against other studios.

The deal announced Monday was the first reached with big-screen producers by the Writers Guild of America.

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WASHINGTON — The Bush administration is working to combat the country's severe housing crisis but there is no simple solution, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said Monday, adding that a correction in the housing market is "inevitable and necessary."

Paulson said the country was facing an unprecedented wave of 1.8 million subprime mortgages that are scheduled to reset to sharply higher rates over the next two years.

He said this raised the threat of a market failure and was the reason the administration brokered a deal with the mortgage industry to freeze certain subprime mortgage rates for five years to allow the housing market to recover.

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CHARLOTTE, N.C. — After years of trying to get its recipe right to run a profitable company, Krispy Kreme Doughnuts Inc. on Monday added yet another ingredient: A new CEO.

The Winston-Salem-based doughnut chain announced that Chief Executive Daryl Brewster has resigned and will be replaced with the company's chairman, James H. Morgan.

Brewster left his position for personal reasons but will stay with Krispy Kreme until the end of January, the company said.

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WASHINGTON — Battered in recent months because of a failed buyout and higher borrowing costs, shares of Sallie Mae jumped Monday after the company named a banking industry turnaround specialist as its new chairman.

Analysts are not convinced, however, that new blood on its board is enough to resuscitate the nation's largest student lender.

Sallie Mae's new chairman is Anthony P. Terracciano, who has been known as "Tony the Tiger" for his experience advising troubled banks and working on sales of some of them.

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NEW YORK — Oil futures fell sharply Monday, extending their retreat from $100 as investors sold on concerns that a cooling economy will curb demand for oil and gasoline.

Comments by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson Monday suggesting there is no simple fix for the nation's housing crisis added to worries about the economy raised by last Friday's Labor Department jobs report; the government's data showed that employers added far fewer jobs last month than expected.

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SAN FRANCISCO — A group of dissident investors is vying to seize control of CNet Networks Inc.'s board in an attempt to shake up the online technology news and entertainment company, which has been struggling for years to capitalize on one of the Internet's largest audiences.

The rebellion, disclosed Monday in a filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission, may raise the stakes of CNet's annual shareholders meeting.

The meeting hasn't been scheduled yet, but it's usually held in May or June.

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HARTFORD, Conn. — The former chairman and CEO of the world's largest insurer initiated a deal that led to five ex-executives being charged with participating in a scheme to manipulate the company's financial statements, a federal prosecutor said Monday during opening arguments at their trial.

Four former executives of Berkshire Hathaway's General Re Corp. and a former executive of American International Group Inc. are charged in the scheme involving AIG's financial statements.