Blackstone May Back Walker’s Iceland Bid, Sunday Telegraph Says

By Maria Ermakova - Oct 9, 2011 4:55 PM GMT+0700

Blackstone Group LP (BX) may back the bid for Iceland Foods Ltd. by Malcolm Walker, the retailer’s founder and chief executive officer, the Sunday Telegraph reported.

The U.S. private equity firm has held talks with Walker about backing his likely bid of as much as 1.5 billion pounds for the 77 percent of Iceland Foods that he doesn’t already own, the newspaper said, citing unidentified people.

The first-round bids are expected to be submitted by the middle of this month and Walker may make a decision on how to finance his bid as soon as this week, the Sunday Telegraph said. The retailer is being sold by Icelandic banks Landsbanki Islands HF and Glitnir Banki HF, according to the newspaper. Officials at Blackstone declined to comment to the Sunday Telegraph.

To contact the reporter on this story: Maria Ermakova in London at mermakova@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Colin Keatinge at ckeatinge@bloomberg.net

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Romney Says Religion Shouldn’t Divide Party

By Gopal Ratnam - Oct 9, 2011 11:00 AM GMT+0700

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, who was labeled a cult member last week, said religious differences shouldn’t divide Republicans and urged civility in party’s 2012 presidential nomination process.

“Poisonous language does not advance our cause,” the former Massachusetts governor and current frontrunner in polls, said yesterday at the “Values Voter Summit” in Washington. The conference is held by evangelical Christians, an important voting bloc in the Republican nominating contests. “Decency and civility is a value, too,” he said.

Robert Jeffress, a Baptist minister from Dallas, told reporters that Romney, a Mormon, is “a good, moral person, but someone who is part of a cult.” Jeffress, who introduced Perry Oct. 7 at the summit, supports Republican rival Rick Perry, the Texas governor.

Perry “does not believe Mormonism is a cult,” spokesman Mark Miner in a statement. Romney didn’t directly address that comment yesterday.

Romney’s religion and his record favoring same-sex marriage and abortion rights while governor -- both of which he now opposes -- became a focus at the summit.

The annual gathering focuses on efforts to “champion traditional values,” limit government and cut federal spending. Self-described evangelicals accounted for 44 percent of Republican primary voters in the 2008 campaign, according to exit polling.

Ron Paul Wins

Representative Ron Paul of Texas, also seeking the 2012 Republican nomination, won a straw poll held at the summit with 37 percent of the votes cast, according to Paul’s campaign. Businessman Herman Cain received 23 percent of the votes, followed by former Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania with 16 percent, and Perry and Minnesota Representative Michele Bachmann each with 8 percent. Romney won the 2007 straw poll with 27.6 percent of the votes, according to the Family Research Council, which organizes the summit.

Summit attendee Ellen Elmore, 62, of St. Louis, said Romney’s record may be used against him in the presidential election if he becomes the Republican Party’s candidate.

“I think there are two Romneys: One is what he says and one is what he does, and we never know which one we are getting,” Elmore said, adding that she voted for Romney in the 2008 Republican primaries.

Abortion, Gay Rights

Romney supported legal abortion and advocated for gay rights when he won the Massachusetts governorship in 2002. When he sought the 2008 presidential nomination, his position on both issues had changed: He supported a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage and opposed abortion rights.

Romney drew the loudest cheers when he said during his speech that he would support the Defense of Marriage Act, which defines marriage as being between a man and a woman, and when he called on the Supreme Court to overturn its 1973 Roe v. Wade decision making abortion legal in the U.S.. He said he wanted to return the law to state jurisdiction.

Elmore said Romney switching his position showed he was “very plastic, robotic and a typical politician,” who “expects us to vote for him because he’s next in line.”

Elmore said she would pick either Cain or former House Speaker Newt Gingrich as the party’s candidate.

Bill Westerling, 73, of Saint Charles, Illinois, said he was leaning in favor of Romney “regardless of his religion, because of his experience” as a former governor and a business executive.

Economy and Jobs

Romney focused most of his comments on the economy and jobs, criticizing President Barack Obama’s economic stimulus program. Perry also focused on the economy, spotlighting his call for lower taxes on businesses and a freeze on pending government regulations, as well as promoting Texas’s job-growth record during his almost 11 years as governor.

“I’ve listened to thousands of Americans and they are not under any illusions about the current state of our country,” Perry said. “They know our first order of business to getting Americans working again is sending our current president to the private sector.”

Perry has dropped in opinion polls after drawing attacks from his Republican opponents in recent debates. A Washington Post-ABC News poll of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents taken Sept. 29-Oct. 2 gave Perry 16 percent, a decline of 13 percentage points since early September. Romney led the Republican field with 25 percent. Perry was tied for second in the survey with Cain.

Tax Simplification

Cain drew standing ovations at the summit as he stressed his opposition to abortion rights, his support of traditional marriage and his pledge to simplify the tax code. He also chastised the “Occupy Wall Street” protests. He said the demonstrators are “anti-capitalism” and “anti-free-market.”

Rival Bachmann, a Minnesota congresswoman, said the Tea Party movement’s push for significantly limited government would join with independent voters and disaffected Democrats to defeat Obama in next year’s general election.

“This is not the election to choose a moderate or a compromise candidate,” she said. “Conservatives, we can have it all this year.”

Proving socially conservative credentials on issues such as abortion, traditional marriage and school prayer won’t be enough for candidates this year, said Ralph Reed, founder and chairman of the Faith and Freedom Coalition.

“The evangelicals want to win, and they’re smart enough to know that to win you’ve got to have a compelling message on the economy,” Reed said.

Obama “has done a better job of energizing and focusing evangelicals and other social conservatives in this country than I thought anyone could ever do,” said Richard Land, leader of the Nashville, Tennessee-based Southern Baptist Convention.

To contact the reporters on this story: Catherine Dodge in Washington at cdodge1@bloomberg.net; Kristin Jensen in Washington at kjensen@bloomberg.net; Gopal Ratnam in Washington at gratnam1@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Mark Silva at msilva34@bloomberg.net

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Smithsonian Closed After Scuffle With Protesters

By Carol Wolf - Oct 9, 2011 5:59 AM GMT+0700

The Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum in Washington was closed today after a security officer used chemical spray to thwart the assault of another when about 150 people converged to protest the use of drones.

The guards were attempting the stop the protesters from entering the building, John Gibbons, a Smithsonian spokesman, said in a telephone interview. One security guard was held against the wall by demonstrators, he said. Several were treated at the scene for respiratory distress after another guard released the spray, and one woman was arrested.

A group called “Stop the Machine” may have organized the protest, which began about 3 p.m., Gibbons said. The demonstrators were protesting an exhibit containing a drone, or unmanned aerial vehicle, Gibbons said. The U.S. has used drones flown remotely by pilots during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan for surveillance and to fire weapons.

One protester carried a sign saying “Don’t let the government put blood on your hands,” with the word “hand” replaced with an image, Gibbons said.

The Museum is expected to open at its normal time of 10 a.m. tomorrow, Gibbons said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Carol Wolf in Washington at cwolf@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Mark Silva at msilva34@bloomberg.net

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China Cuts Gasoline Prices for First Time This Year as Oil Costs Plunge

By Bloomberg News - Oct 9, 2011 8:43 AM GMT+0700

China cut fuel prices for the first time this year after crude oil costs plunged as the global economy slowed.

Ex-factory gasoline was reduced by 300 yuan ($47.20) a metric ton, or 3.5 percent, starting today, and diesel was also lowered by 300 yuan, or 3.9 percent, the National Development and Reform Commission, the nation’s top economic planner, said in a statement on its website yesterday. The upper limit for retail gasoline dropped as much as 3.3 percent and diesel by 3.6 percent.

Oil traded in New York fell about 24 percent since China last adjusted prices on April 6, while Brent crude, the benchmark for about half the world’s oil, slid 13 percent. China last reduced oil-product prices in June 2010 and has increased them four times, by about 20 percent, since then.

“China hadn’t raised fuel prices enough when crude climbed to records in late-April and early May, amid concerns of inflation,” and this delayed any move to cut prices before now, the NDRC said in a separate statement on its website, citing comments from an official it didn’t identify.

China adjusts gasoline, diesel and kerosene rates when the moving average of three crude grades comprising Brent, Dubai and Cinta changes more than 4 percent over 22 working days. The government may increase the frequency of fuel price adjustments and change the global crude price benchmarks it monitors, the NDRC said yesterday, without being specific.

“China is unlikely to cut fuel prices further should the crude prices stay at the current levels,” Yin Xiaodong, the chief oil analyst at Beijing-based Citic Securities Co., said today by phone.

Containing Inflation

Lower fuel prices may help the country contain inflation. Consumer price growth eased from a three-year high to 6.2 percent in August, while industrial output slowed for a second month, giving policy makers more room to pause on monetary tightening as the economy cools and a global slowdown threatens exports and jobs.

Chinese refiners will still face losses after the cut and the government has told oil companies to ensure supply, the planning agency said. China Petroleum & Chemical Corp. (386) and PetroChina Co. are the country’s largest refiners.

China is cutting fuel prices as tightness in domestic fuel supply eases. The government reduced fuel-oil import tariffs in July. It also pressured privately held refineries to increase processing, the official Xinhua News Agency said on Aug. 8, citing an unidentified NDRC official.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Paul Gordon at pgordon6@bloomberg.net

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Business Jet Sales May Increase in 2012 as Asia Blunts Slow Global Economy

By Susanna Ray and Rachel Layne - Oct 9, 2011 8:30 AM GMT+0700

Business-jet sales may increase worldwide starting in 2012 as emerging-market demand blunts a sluggish U.S. economy that fueled a probable decline this year, Honeywell International Inc. (HON) projected.

Purchase expectations are growing in Asia, followed by the Middle East and Africa, while the free-fall in developed markets like North America following 2008’s recession has stabilized, according to an annual survey of 1,500 companies by the Morris Township, New Jersey-based avionics and cockpit-instruments maker.

Companies also have cash to spend now, compensating for individuals that might hold back amid economic uncertainty, Rob Wilson, president of Honeywell’s business and general aviation unit, said in an interview. Replacement of aging planes has combined with international travel demand to boost potential sales of longer-range models, he said.

“Cautious optimism” will be a theme at the National Business Aviation Association’s annual conference that starts Oct. 10 in Las Vegas, Wilson said. “We’re figuring out how to make the most of it in uncertain times.”

Customers continue to say that they still intend to buy new aircraft in the next five years, though some have pushed out the timing to the latter half of that period, Wilson said.

Air-travel demand has been boosted by growing trade between Africa and China, a run-up in commodity prices and oil, and the exploration of new business opportunities in those regions, Wilson said.

Declining Deliveries

By the time the survey was conducted between May and August, much of the turmoil in the larger Middle East countries had settled down, he said.

Global deliveries probably will decline to 600 to 650 from last year’s 732, then climb in 2012 to less than 700, Honeywell projected.

The percentage of active fleets comprised by used jets for sale has declined about four points from a peak in 2009 amid the financial crisis, the survey found.

Business-jet manufacturers are building new models with greater range to lure buyers away from the used-aircraft market. General Dynamics Corp. (GD)’s Gulfstream, Textron Inc. (TXT)’s Cessna and Embraer SA (EMBR3) are all developing new planes to enter service over the next two years.

While a good leading indicator of future demand, prices are still far below 2008’s peak levels, indicating fleet managers remain cautious, some analysts have said.

How “increasingly acute macro concerns” are affecting business-jet demand will be a key topic at the business-jet association’s meeting, Joseph Nadol, an analyst with JPMorgan Chase & Co. in New York, wrote in an Oct. 7 note.

Larger Jets

“We would not be surprised by a continuation of recent trends, including solid demand for larger, long-range jets, primarily from emerging markets, and far more modest demand for light jets,” due in part to economic weakness in the U.S., Nadol wrote.

Bigger jets that can fly farther and are favored by corporate fleets are faring better than smaller planes that interest individual buyers, Wilson said.

“The bottom half of the business-jet market, the half most dependent on external finance, imploded, falling 57.1 percent in two years” in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, said Richard Aboulafia with Teal Group, a Fairfax, Virginia-based aviation consulting firm. “That’s the worst market drop I’ve ever seen.”

The top half, whose corporate customers are much less reliant on credit, actually grew by 1.5 percent, Aboulafia wrote in a September note.

Engine Sales

Demand for small and medium-sized jets is likely to remain stagnant, Honeywell said. As planemakers use up long-held inventory, parts makers may see a pickup before planemakers do.

John Saabas, who runs Pratt & Whitney Canada, the biggest maker of engines for small and medium-sized business aircraft, said he doesn’t expect gains until the end of 2012.

“We have an opportunity on the engine side, just because the inventory levels have been depleted so much over the last couple of years,” Saabas said in an interview. “When it comes to growth in the whole market, that takes more time. People have to negotiate deals. The latest events in the U.S. and Europe -- people were going to wait out deals, wait and see what happens. That’s where some of the more softness part comes in.”

The market overall “has held relatively stable over the last several months, albeit at already low levels, despite a worsening economic outlook,” David Strauss, an analyst with UBS Securities LLC in New York, wrote in an Oct. 6 note.

Still, Strauss warned in his monthly report that “softness in our survey of industry professionals and other key bizjet market indicators we track, including flight activity and used pricing, leaves us less optimistic about a recovery in 2012.”

To contact the reporters on this story: Rachel Layne in Boston at rlayne@bloomberg.net; Susanna Ray in Seattle at sray7@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Ed Dufner at edufner@bloomberg.net

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Pakistan Reduces Key Rate, Beating Forecasts to Boost Expansion

By Farhan Sharif - Oct 9, 2011 2:01 AM GMT+0700

Pakistan’s central bank cut its benchmark interest rate by a more-than-expected 1.5 percentage points to spur investment after terrorism and floods undermined economic growth.

The State Bank of Pakistan lowered the discount rate to 12 percent from 13.5 percent, Syed Wasimuddin, a central bank spokesman, said in Karachi yesterday. Three of five economists surveyed by Bloomberg News predicted a 1 percentage point cut, and the remainder forecast a 0.5 percent reduction.

Acting Governor Yaseen Anwar had room to act and join emerging markets from Russia to Brazil in lowering borrowing costs after Pakistan’s inflation rate dropped 2 percentage points in the past three months. A rate cut might support an economy that’s seen growing less than half the pace of fellow South Asian nations India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka this year.

“It’s a bold decision and would help prop up growth,” said Suleman Akhtar, head of research at Foundation Securities Ltd. in Karachi. “Further rate moves would depend on the extent to which the weakening rupee boosts import costs and stokes inflationary pressure.”

The Pakistan rupee has declined 1.9 percent this year and dropped to a record low on Sept. 16, prompting the central bank last month to conduct what it called a “calibrated intervention” to stabilize the currency.

Stocks, Bonds

The Karachi Stock Exchange 100 Index has fallen 1.4 percent since the start of this year, while Pakistan’s 10-year government bond yields are trading at 12.6 percent, the highest level after Greece and Venezuela, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Consumer prices rose 10.46 percent in September from a year earlier, after climbing 12.43 percent in July, according to the Federal Bureau of Statistics.

The central bank decided to slash its policy rate for a second straight meeting because of a “high probability” of meeting the FY12 inflation goal and to stimulate investment, according to yesterday’s statement. The State Bank is targeting an average inflation of 12 percent in the year ending June 30.

Even so, there are “upside risks” to meet the inflation target of 9.5 percent for the following fiscal year, stemming from “persistence of government borrowing” from commercial banks, exchange rate depreciation and a likely “upward adjustment” in energy costs, the statement said.

Acting Chief

Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani’s government named Anwar, a deputy governor since March 2007, as the central bank’s acting chief after Shahid Kardar quit on July 12. The State Bank unexpectedly cut rates in the July 30 policy decision, almost three weeks after Kardar resigned blaming state spending for fanning prices.

Anwar cited the government’s commitment to “zero borrowings” from the central bank as one of the reasons for reducing rates in July. The federal government paid back 33 billion rupees ($377 million) to the central bank this fiscal year against 238 billion rupees borrowing in the same period a year ago, according to the central bank.

“Any reduction in interest rates would benefit our plans to expand capacity,” Taha Hamdani, Karachi-based chief financial officer at Thatta Cement Co., said before the report. The company plans to spend 3 billion rupees in the next two years to double production to 3,000 tons a day.

Policy makers in Pakistan are aiming to boost economic growth to 4.2 percent in the fiscal year ending June 30, from 2.4 percent in the previous year, one of the lowest expansions in the past decade, as the country struggled to cope with floods and militant attacks.

Floods, Terrorism

Floods in August forced more than one million people from their homes and damaged crops in parts of southern Pakistan still recovering from last year’s worst ever monsoon inundations that devastated the region. Terror attacks in the South Asian nation have killed at least 35,000 people since 2006, according to government estimates.

Foreign direct investment in Pakistan fell 40 percent to $112.4 million in the first two months of the fiscal year that started July 1 from a year earlier. By contrast, India, from which Pakistan was partitioned in 1947 following independence from British rule, got $13.4 billion in the three months through June, a quarterly record.

As Pakistan’s relations with the U.S., its biggest donor, frayed since Navy Seals killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in a unilateral raid on May 2, China has emerged as a key ally, according to Saleem H. Mandviwalla, the chairman of the government’s Board of Investment.

“Pakistan needs to fire on all cylinders to support growth,” said Farid Aliani, a Karachi-based analyst at BMA Captial Ltd. “Easing monetary policy would help.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Farhan Sharif in Karachi, Pakistan at fsharif@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Dick Schumacher at dschumacher@bloomberg.net

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Saudi Arabia Beheads 8 Bangladeshis for Murder; 2011 Executions Rise to 58

By Glen Carey - Oct 9, 2011 1:01 AM GMT+0700

Saudi Arabia beheaded eight Bangladeshi nationals in public yesterday for the murder of an Egyptian citizen in 2007, the official Saudi Press Agency reported, citing an Interior Ministry statement.

The Egyptian was killed during a robbery of a warehouse in Riyadh, the news service said, citing the ministry’s statement. Three other Bangladeshis were sentenced to prison terms and flogging for their roles in the crime.

Saudi Arabia, where religious police patrol shopping centers and cinemas are prohibited, enforces Islamic law. The kingdom usually beheads or sentences people to lashings for murder, rape and drug-smuggling. The Sunni Muslim-majority country and member of the Group of 20 nations has been criticized by international human rights groups.

Two other Saudi nationals were executed in the northern city of Tabuk yesterday, bringing the total number of executions to 10, London-based Amnesty International said in a statement on its website yesterday. At least 58 people have been executed in the country this year, including 20 foreign nationals, Amnesty said.

“Court proceedings in Saudi Arabia fall far short of international standards for fair trial and news of these recent multiple executions is deeply disturbing,” Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui, Amnesty’s Deputy Director for Middle East and North Africa, said in the statement.

The number of executions had been declining, dropping to 27 people in 2010 and 69 in 2009 from about 102 the year earlier and 158 in 2007, according to Amnesty.

To contact the reporter on this story: Glen Carey in Dubai at gcarey8@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Andrew J. Barden at barden@bloomberg.net

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Pelosi: Wall St. Protesters Angry Over Jobless

By Editors: Ann Hughey - Oct 9, 2011 12:54 AM GMT+0700

“Occupy Wall Street” protesters are angry over the lack of employment prospects and government actions that are “not relevant to their lives,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said.

“I think they are angry that they don’t have jobs,” Pelosi told ABC News’ “This Week” program, scheduled for broadcast tomorrow. “There’s nothing that makes you angrier than not being able to provide for your family or understand what your prospects are for the future.”

Americans’ pessimism about the economy helped send President Barack Obama’s approval rating to 38 percent last week, the lowest of his presidency. The nation’s jobless rate, which has been at 9 percent or higher since April, remained at 9.1 percent last month.

The stagnant labor market has limited consumer spending, which grew at 0.7 percent last month, the smallest increase since the last three months of 2009. The European debt crisis threatens to trigger another recession.

The protestors’ message to the “establishment,” including Wall Street and politicians, is that “change has to happen,” Pelosi said on ABC. The U.S. government’s bailout of banks hasn’t made capital available to average citizens as expected, the California Democrat said.

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, a Virginia Republican, has called the movement “growing mobs” that are dividing the country. Obama, a Democrat, has expressed empathy with the demonstrators while stopping short of endorsing their movement.

“Occupy Wall Street” began three weeks ago in Lower Manhattan and has spread to cities such as Washington and San Francisco.

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Oakland Raiders’ Renegade Owner Al Davis Dies at 82

By Laurence Arnold - Oct 9, 2011 2:19 AM GMT+0700

Al Davis, the renegade owner of the Oakland Raiders whose battles with the National Football League gave him an outlaw image matching that of his silver-and-black- clad team, has died. He was 82.

The Raiders announced his death on their website, without providing any further details.

While imploring his players on the field to “Just win, baby,” Davis ran some of football’s biggest sideshows.

He first faced off with the NFL in the 1960s when, as the hard-charging commissioner of the rival American Football League, he escalated a tug-of-war for top players. The two leagues merged months into his tenure.

As owner of the Raiders, the team he led and loved as far back as 1963, he moved the franchise out of Oakland and to Los Angeles, then back to Oakland 13 years later, in a bid for a better stadium. He feuded with the NFL and with at least one Raiders star, Marcus Allen.

The Raiders won Super Bowls in 1976, 1980 and 1983 as well as 15 AFC West titles during an extended reign as one of the league’s best teams from 1963 to 2002. More recently they were among the league’s worst, winning 29 games and losing 83 from 2003 through 2009, before posting an 8-8 record in 2010. Oakland has a 2-2 record this season going into tomorrow’s game in Houston.

‘I’m the Raiders’

“People love the Raiders and every time they think of the Raiders, they think of Mr. Davis,” Willie Brown, a Hall of Fame cornerback and now an assistant with the team, said in a statement. “It’s a sad day in the Raider nation.”

Forbes magazine estimated the franchise’s value at $761 million in 2011, higher than only one other team, the Jacksonville Jaguars, in the 32-team league.

“History will dictate what my legacy is,” Davis said in an interview for “Straight Outta L.A.,” a documentary directed by rapper Ice Cube for ESPN in 2010. “Maverick is fine, ‘cause I am. Outlaw I’m not. But if believing in what you believe and sticking up for your rights and sticking up for the rights of others from time to time -- do it your way. Don’t let the culture tell you what do. That’s being a Raider.”

Regarding the team’s recent run of ineptitude, he said, “We slipped tremendously, and it’s my fault. I’m the custodian. I’m the Raiders, at least the face of it.”

On and On

Davis was inducted in 1992 into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, which hailed him as the only person to work in professional football as personnel assistant, scout, assistant coach, head coach, general manager, commissioner and team owner. “I love the game, I love the league, I love my team,” he said at his induction ceremony.

Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones said today, “There was no element of the game of professional football for which Al did not enjoy a thorough and complete level of knowledge and passion.”

“He’ll be sorely missed,” said Jim Plunkett, who quarterbacked the Raiders’ last two Super Bowl-winning teams. “His contributions to the game of football go on and on.”

“Al Davis’s passion for football and his influence on the game were extraordinary,” NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said in a statement. “He defined the Raiders and contributed to pro football at every level.”

Racehorse Football

Arthur Allen Davis was born on July 4, 1929, in Brockton, Massachusetts, the second of two sons in a Jewish family. He grew up in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, where his family had moved for his father’s work as a rain-coat manufacturer.

He was a reserve on the Erasmus Hall High School basketball team and was cut from the varsity football team at Syracuse University, where he earned an English degree, according to a 1991 Los Angeles Times profile.

Right out of college, he became line coach for the football team at Adelphi College in New York, then head coach of the U.S. Army team at Ft. Belvoir, Virginia. For one year, 1954, he ran player personnel for the Baltimore Colts of the NFL, then returned to the college ranks at The Citadel, where he introduced an early no-huddle offense called racehorse football, and at the University of Southern California.

“All my life, all I wanted to do was coach and lead men,” he told the ESPN documentary. The Los Angeles Times reported in 1991 that Davis’s fascination with military history was reflected in a slogan on each edition of the team’s travel itinerary: “Let’s go to war!”

NFL, AFL Merger

In 1960, he moved permanently to the pros, coaching receivers for the Los Angeles Chargers in their inaugural season in the American Football League. Before the 1963 season he became head coach and general manager of the Oakland Raiders, who had won just nine games and lost 33 in their first three years. Davis turned the team around, winning AFL coach of the year honors after a 10-4 season.

AFL owners named him commissioner in April 1966. He pledged to fight the bigger, more established NFL for top players and declared himself uninterested in merging the two leagues.

Within months, though, back-channel negotiations among owners of the two leagues produced a merger agreement and, in January 1967, the first game between NFL and AFL champions -- what would later become known as Super Bowl I.

Davis, “feeling betrayed and made to look foolish” by the merger, according to biographer Mark Ribowsky, returned to the Raiders as part-owner and managing general partner. The team earned a spot in Super Bowl II, losing to the Green Bay Packers.

Sole General Partner

During the next two decades, Davis first outmaneuvered one partner and then outlived another to become the franchise’s majority owner and sole general partner. His ascendancy coincided with that of the team. The Raiders cruised through the 1976 season on the way to their first championship in Super Bowl XI, winning again in 1980 and 1983.

The first two championships were as Oakland’s team, while the 1983 triumph culminated the team’s first year as the Raiders of Los Angeles.

Davis moved the franchise, over the objections of other NFL team owners, after asking for the addition of luxury boxes at Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum. With the Los Angeles Coliseum Commission, the Raiders went to court to successfully challenge an NFL rule requiring teams to win league consent before relocating. The team and commission also won millions in damages in an antitrust case against the league.

Back to Oakland

In 1987, following the collapse of plans to renovate their new home, Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, the Raiders signed a deal with another nearby city -- Irwindale, which agreed to lend $115 million for a new 65,000-seat stadium to be built by 1990.

That too, devolved into squabbling, and in 1990, after a public courtship with yet another suitor, Sacramento, the Raiders announced they would return to Oakland, which also fell through. The team signed a 20-year lease agreement to remain in Los Angeles, with $145 million in promised renovations to the Los Angeles Coliseum. Those renovations weren’t made.

After the 1994 season, Davis gave up on one final prospect, a new stadium at Hollywood Park in Los Angeles. “The owners stopped me,” he said on ESPN. “For them to give their OK, they wanted me to take a second team, and I wouldn’t take a second NFL team into Hollywood Park. I just wanted to be alone.” He brought the team back to Oakland, which agreed to add seats and make other improvements to its stadium.

His Own Course

Davis followed his own course other times as well.

In the 1987 draft, Davis used the Raiders’ final pick to choose Bo Jackson, even though Jackson one year earlier had rebuffed football for Major League Baseball. Wooed by Davis, who offered full-time pay for part-time play, Jackson joined the Raiders after the 1987 baseball season ended and went on to play through 1991.

In 1989, Davis promoted Art Shell, a former Raider star player, from assistant coach to head coach, making him the first black head coach in the modern era of the NFL.

Davis never cited a reason for his long feud with Allen, the running back who was the team’s first-round draft pick in 1982 and most valuable player of Super Bowl XVIII. In a television interview in his final months with the team in 1992, Allen said Davis had “attempted to ruin” his career.

Asked about Allen in the ESPN documentary, Davis would say only, “It’s a deeper story than you even dream, that I was well aware of, and I just got a certain approach to life.”

Davis and his wife, Carol, had a son, Mark.

To contact the reporter on this story: Laurence Arnold in Washington at larnold4@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: James Greiff at jgreiff@bloomberg.net

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Max Bank Will Fail Under Denmark’s Bail-In Law, Government Says

By Christian Wienberg - Oct 9, 2011 5:07 AM GMT+0700

The Danish government’s wind-up unit said it will probably take over regional lender Max Bank (MAX) A/S, which would become the third failure this year under the European Union’s toughest resolution laws.

The Financial Stability Company will probably take over and wind up the Naestved-based lender today, it said in an e-mail statement late yesterday. In a separate statement, Max Bank said the Danish Financial Supervisory Authority had told it after an inspection to increase writedowns on bad loans and boost solvency before a deadline of 6 p.m. today.

Denmark enacted a law in October last year making it the first EU member to force senior bank creditors to bear losses within a resolution framework. Since then, two regional lenders have collapsed and international investors have withheld funding for most of the nation’s 120 banks. Max Bank said yesterday the OMX Copenhagen stock exchange had agreed to suspend trading of its shares and bonds.

“If the bank can’t meet the deadline set by the FSA to raise sufficient capital, or find another resolution to the banks situation, it will allow itself to be settled under the resolution laws,” Max Bank said in its statement.

To spur takeovers and avoid more bail-ins, Danish lawmakers last month passed the fourth bank rescue package in three years. The legislation extends the maturity of state-guaranteed debt and allows the government to take over bad loans from ailing banks in the event of a merger. The Financial Stability Company said today that Max Bank may be resolved under the fourth package, suggesting another bank may step in with a takeover offer.

Max Bank has bonds out worth 3 billion kroner ($540 million), according to Bloomberg data. The bank’s stock market value was 59.5 million kroner as of Oct. 7’s closing price after the shares lost 72 percent this year.

The bank had assets of 9.39 billion kroner at the end of June, according to its first-half earnings report. It was the third-riskiest of 99 Danish banks graded by researcher Niro Invest ApS in a June survey.

To contact the reporter on this story: Christian Wienberg in Copenhagen at cwienberg@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Tasneem Brogger at tbrogger@bloomberg.net

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Romney Calls for Civility, Unity Among Religions at Republican Conference

By Gopal Ratnam, Catherine Dodge and Kristin Jensen - Oct 9, 2011 3:50 AM GMT+0700
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Tea Party activist William Temple holds up his Michele Bachmann badge as he talks with other attendees at the Family Research Council's Values Voter Summit in Washington on Oct. 7, 2011. Photographer: Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call/Newscom

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, who was labeled a cult member yesterday, said religious differences shouldn’t divide Republicans and urged civility in party’s 2012 presidential nomination process.

“Poisonous language does not advance our cause,” the former Massachusetts governor and current frontrunner in polls, said today at the “Values Voter Summit” in Washington. The conference is held by evangelical Christians, an important voting bloc in the Republican nominating contests. “Decency and civility is a value, too,” he said.

Robert Jeffress, a Baptist minister from Dallas, told reporters yesterday that Romney, a Mormon, is “a good, moral person, but someone who is part of a cult.” Jeffress, who introduced Perry yesterday at the summit, supports Republican rival Rick Perry, the Texas governor.

Perry “does not believe Mormonism is a cult,” spokesman Mark Miner in a statement. Romney didn’t directly address that comment today.

Romney’s religion and his record favoring same-sex marriage and abortion rights while governor -- both of which he now opposes -- became the focus of the debate at the summit today.

The annual gathering focuses on efforts to “champion traditional values,” limit government and cut federal spending. Self-described evangelicals accounted for 44 percent of Republican primary voters in the 2008 campaign, according to exit polling.

Ron Paul Wins

Representative Ron Paul of Texas, also seeking the 2012 Republican nomination, won a straw poll held at the summit today with 37 percent of the votes cast, according to Paul’s campaign. Businessman Herman Cain received 23 percent of the votes, followed by former Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania with 16 percent, and Perry and Minnesota Representative Michele Bachmann each with 8 percent. Romney won the 2007 straw poll with 27.6 percent of the votes, according to the Family Research Council, which organizes the summit.

Summit attendee Ellen Elmore, 62, of St. Louis, said Romney’s record may be used against him in the presidential election if he becomes the Republican Party’s candidate.

Two Romneys

“I think there are two Romneys: One is what he says and one is what he does, and we never know which one we are getting,” Elmore said, adding that she voted for Romney in the 2008 Republican primaries. “In the past, he said again and again that he believed in a woman’s right to choose and he would never change that. But excuse me, that’s not what he said up there.”

Romney supported legal abortion and advocated for gay rights when he won the Massachusetts governorship in 2002. When he sought the 2008 presidential nomination, his position on both issues had changed: He supported a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage and opposed abortion rights.

Romney drew the loudest cheers when he said during his speech that he would support the Defense of Marriage Act, which defines marriage as being between a man and a woman, and when he called on the Supreme Court to overturn its 1973 Roe v. Wade decision making abortion legal in the U.S.. He said he wanted to return the law to state jurisdiction.

Plastic Politician

Elmore said Romney switching his position showed he was “very plastic, robotic and a typical politician,” who “expects us to vote for him because he’s next in line.”

Elmore said she would pick either Cain or former House Speaker Newt Gingrich as the party’s candidate.

Bill Westerling, 73, of Saint Charles, Illinois, said he was leaning in favor of Romney “regardless of his religion, because of his experience” as a former governor and a business executive.

Romney focused most of his comments on the economy and jobs, criticizing President Barack Obama’s economic stimulus program. Perry also focused on the economy, spotlighting his call for lower taxes on businesses and a freeze on pending government regulations, as well as promoting Texas’s job-growth record during his almost 11 years as governor.

“I’ve listened to thousands of Americans and they are not under any illusions about the current state of our country,” Perry said yesterday. “They know our first order of business to getting Americans working again is sending our current president to the private sector.”

Perry’s Poll Drop

Perry has dropped in opinion polls after drawing attacks from his Republican opponents in recent debates. A Washington Post-ABC News poll of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents taken Sept. 29-Oct. 2 gave Perry 16 percent, a decline of 13 percentage points since early September. Romney led the Republican field with 25 percent. Perry was tied for second in the survey with Cain.

Cain drew standing ovations yesterday as he stressed his opposition to abortion rights, his support of traditional marriage and his pledge to simplify the tax code. He also chastised the “Occupy Wall Street” protests. He said the demonstrators are “anti-capitalism” and “anti-free-market.”

Rival Bachmann, a Minnesota congresswoman, said the Tea Party movement’s push for significantly limited government would join with independent voters and disaffected Democrats to defeat Obama in next year’s general election.

No Moderate Candidate

“This is not the election to choose a moderate or a compromise candidate,” she said. “Conservatives, we can have it all this year.”

Proving socially conservative credentials on issues such as abortion, traditional marriage and school prayer won’t be enough for candidates this year, said Ralph Reed, founder and chairman of the Faith and Freedom Coalition.

“The evangelicals want to win, and they’re smart enough to know that to win you’ve got to have a compelling message on the economy,” Reed said.

Evangelical voters “want the most conservative candidate that can win,” said Richard Land, leader of the Nashville, Tennessee-based Southern Baptist Convention. “Mr. Obama has done a better job of energizing and focusing evangelicals and other social conservatives in this country than I thought anyone could ever do.”

With the exception of Romney, all the candidates are well positioned with these voters, said Craig Shirley, a political consultant and Reagan historian in Alexandria, Virginia.

“If you polled the segment right now, I would say it’s up for grabs,” Shirley said.

To contact the reporters on this story: Catherine Dodge in Washington at cdodge1@bloomberg.net; Kristin Jensen in Washington at kjensen@bloomberg.net; Gopal Ratnam in Washington at gratnam1@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Mark Silva at msilva34@bloomberg.net

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Ex-Beatle McCartney to Marry in London

By Paul Dobson - Oct 8, 2011 7:49 PM GMT+0700

Paul McCartney will marry Nancy Shevell in London tomorrow, the Mirror reported, citing a person close to the musician and former member of the Beatles that it didn’t identify.

Thirty guests will attend the ceremony at Westminster Register Office, after McCartney, 69, got special dispensation from the local council to get married on a Sunday, the newspaper said. Shevell, 51, is a U.S. heiress, the paper said.

The reception for tomorrow’s wedding will be held in a marquee in the garden of McCartney’s London home, according to the Mirror. Guests will dine on an entirely vegetarian three- course meal mostly made with organic produce, which McCartney’s daughter Stella helped choose, the newspaper said. His brother, Mike, will be best man, the newspaper said.

It will be McCartney’s third marriage, after first wife Linda Eastman, whom he married in 1969, died of breast cancer in 1998 and following a divorce from second wife Heather Mills in 2006, according to the Mirror. Mills was awarded 24 million pounds ($32 million) and 35,000 pounds a year payments to support their daughter in a court-ruling on the divorce, the Mirror said.

A spokesman for McCartney declined to comment, according to the Mirror.

To contact the reporter on this story: Paul Dobson in London at pdobson2@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Mike Harrison at mharrison5@bloomberg.net

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Al-Naimi Says Oil Market Not Oversupplied

By Wael Mahdi - Oct 8, 2011 5:22 PM GMT+0700

Saudi Arabian Oil Minister Ali Al- Naimi said there’s no excess supply in world oil markets and that the kingdom has been adjusting output to match fluctuating demand over recent months.

“There is no oversupply in the market right now,” he told reporters in Dhahran today.

The country, OPEC’s biggest producer, will keep pumping at current rates even if Libyan output returns to the market this year, as long as customers are in need of the oil, the minister said. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries meets next on Dec. 14 in Vienna to decide whether it needs to alter production targets.

Saudi Arabia supplied 9.39 million barrels of crude oil a day to the market in September, Al-Naimi said. Corresponding figures for June, July and August were 9.8 million, 9.6 million and 9.8 million, he said.

“I’m giving you these numbers to show that demand is fluctuating this year,” he said. “Demand is always fluctuating, but our position is we would supply whatever our customers are asking for.”

OPEC’s main crude oil grades rose above $100 a barrel on Oct. 6, after falling below that level earlier in the week for the first time since February.

Basket Below $100

The price advanced to $101.63, from $99.90 on Oct. 5, according to OPEC’s website. The so-called OPEC basket is calculated on the basis of one key export blend from each of the organization’s 12 members, weighted according to production.

OPEC ministers last met in June, when six members including Iran and Venezuela rejected a Saudi proposal to replace lost Libyan crude. Saudi Arabia and some other members had already boosted production after armed conflict in Libya that began in February curbed almost all of that country’s 1.6 million barrels a day of production.

Bloomberg estimates show Libya producing 100,000 barrels a day on average last month, and Saudi Arabia 9.76 million barrels a day. Libya is the only OPEC member not exceeding its official quota, aside from Iraq which has no target.

To contact the reporter on this story: Wael Mahdi in Dhahran at wmahdi@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Stephen Voss at sev@bloomberg.net

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Obama Asks Americans to Push Jobs Bill

By Margaret Talev - Oct 8, 2011 5:00 PM GMT+0700

President Barack Obama said his $447 billion jobs package, which faces a test vote in the Senate, would provide the U.S. economy “with the jolt that it really needs right now” and asked Americans to urge their senators to support the legislation.

“This jobs bill can help guard against another downturn here in America,” Obama said today in a weekly radio and Internet address.

Obama met yesterday with Senate Democratic leaders at the White House on a strategy for holding a vote on the plan, a mix of tax cuts and spending aimed at spurring hiring as the nation’s jobless rate remained at 9.1 percent last month. It’s been at 9 percent or higher since April.

The president renewed his call for opponents of the package to “explain why” they oppose provisions, including cutting the payroll tax for workers and employers in half, giving direct aid to states and spending $105 billion on infrastructure projects.

“If the Republicans in Congress think they have a better plan for creating jobs right now, they should prove it,” Obama said. Republicans, who hold the majority in the House of Representatives, oppose tax increases.

Obama defended his plan to raise taxes on the wealthy to pay for the measure. He said at a news conference Oct. 6 that he’s “comfortable” with a proposal by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to offset the cost of the jobs package by imposing a 5.6 percent surtax on those earning at least $1 million. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that would generate $453 billion.

Same Rate

“We can either keep taxes exactly as they are for millionaires and billionaires, or we can ask them to pay at least the same rate as a plumber or a bus driver,” he said in the radio address. “And in the process, we can put teachers and construction workers and veterans back on the job. We can either fight to protect their tax cuts, or we can cut taxes for virtually every worker and small business in America. But we can’t afford to do both.”

Obama’s plan faces hurdles in the House, where Republicans hold the majority and oppose the tax increases in the plan, and in the Senate, where it will take 60 votes to end efforts to obstruct it and Democrats have just 53 seats. Reid has set a vote to proceed on the legislation for Oct. 11.

Senator John Thune of South Dakota, in the weekly Republican address, said the president’s jobs package is a “cynical political ploy” to boost his re-election prospects and “nothing but a rehash of the same failed ideas he’s already tried, combined with a huge tax increase.”

‘Flawed’ Plan

Thune said the plan is “so flawed that Senate Democrats have rejected” elements of it. At the same time, Thune said congressional Democrats’ proposals are “not to grow jobs, but to improve their political standing.” Thune said Obama is to blame for an additional 2 million unemployed, 6 million in poverty, 13 million on food stamps and a 39 percent debt increase since he took office.

Thune called for the U.S. to do “all it can to lower trade barriers” in order to sell more U.S. goods overseas. He criticized Obama for a delay in submitting to Congress trade agreements with Panama, Colombia and South Korea. Obama submitted the trade deals to Congress this week and a vote is scheduled for next week.

Citing a dispute between the National Labor Relations Board and Chicago-based Boeing Co. (BA), Thune said Obama’s administration “would rather have people unemployed than allow them to work in non-union jobs.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Margaret Talev in Washington at 1923 or mtalev@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Mark Silva at msilva34@bloomberg.net.

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Dexia Board Meets as France, Belgium Tussle

By Fabio Benedetti-Valentini - Oct 8, 2011 3:36 PM GMT+0700

Dexia SA (DEXB)’s board meets this weekend to study options to dismantle the French-Belgian bank that has brought Europe’s sovereign debt crisis to the heart of the region’s financial system.

While France and Belgium have rushed to protect their local units, hurdles to an agreement remain as they wrestle over responsibility for assets hit by the crisis that has caused the bank’s short-term funding to evaporate. Dexia’s troubled assets are being folded into a “bad bank” and could amount to as much as 190 billion euros ($256 billion).

Rescuing Dexia -- the first victim of the debt crisis at the core of Europe -- has become critical to preventing contagion in the region’s banking industry. Dexia’s balance sheet, with total assets of about 518 billion euros at the end of June, is about the size of the entire banking system in Greece and larger than the combined assets of financial institutions bailed out in Ireland in the last 2 1/2 years.

“The governments have to reach a deal this weekend or we’ll see trouble on the interbank market next week,” said Michael Rohr, a banking analyst with Silvia Quandt Research GmbH in Frankfurt. “Investors are looking at which banks have large public finance operations like Dexia.”

Paris- and Brussels-based Dexia has retail branch networks in two European Union founding nations -- Belgium and Luxembourg -- and is a former world leader in municipal lending.

Sticking Points

The 18-member board, equally split between France and Belgium, may review a plan under which Dexia would set up a bad bank for its troubled assets, hive off its French municipal loan book into a venture with state-owned La Banque Postale and Caisse des Depots et Consignations, and seek buyers for units such as its Belgian bank, Denizbank AS of Turkey and its asset- management division.

The board meeting -- Saturday or Sunday -- will be the third in less than a month, after those on Sept. 27 and Oct. 3.

Among sticking points for Belgium and France may be which assets to put in the bad bank and what share of the lender’s borrowings each government should guarantee.

“The situation is more complex than one where you have one bank, one country, one regulator,” said Cor Kluis, an Utrecht- based analyst at Rabobank International with a “reduce” recommendation on Dexia. “The process will probably take longer than expected and I don’t know if they’ll be able to reach a solution this weekend.”

Shares Plunge

Dexia dropped 17 percent in Brussels on Oct. 6 before being suspended, and will resume trading on Oct. 10. The stock has fallen 42 percent in the past week on concern that the breakup will leave shareholders with little of value. It has plunged more than 90 percent since the 2008 bailout.

“Once you go on this road, it won’t end well for shareholders,” said Kluis. “Governments aren’t there to save shareholders.”

Standard & Poor’s on Oct. 6 downgraded the credit ratings on three units, Dexia Credit Local, Dexia Bank and Dexia Banque Internationale a Luxembourg, citing the group’s limited access to wholesale funding markets. The ratings are on credit watch with “developing implications,” S&P said.

France and Belgium are coming to Dexia’s rescue three months after it got a clean bill of health in European Union regulators’ stress tests, and three years after they injected capital to save the company during the 2008 credit crunch.

In 2008, after injecting 6 billion euros, the governments provided Dexia guarantees of as much as 150 billion euros. Belgium covered 60.5 percent of the guarantees, France 36.5 percent and Luxembourg 3 percent.

‘Complicated Accord’

Now, negotiations are again focused on who bears what part of the guarantees for the bank.

“It’s complicated for the states to reach an accord,” said Benoit Petrarque, an analyst at Kepler Capital Markets in Amsterdam. “There are budgetary constraints and no one wants to invest capital.”

Belgium’s Aa1 local- and foreign-currency ratings were placed under review for a downgrade by Moody’s Investors Service because of rising funding risks for euro-area nations with high levels of debt and additional bank support measures that are likely to be needed.

Economic Risks

The review will focus on the vulnerabilities of Belgian public debt in the current euro-area sovereign crisis and potential costs and contingent liabilities that the government may incur in supporting Dexia, Moody’s said in a statement yesterday. Moody’s will also assess how the risks for the growth outlook of the economy and the government’s fiscal and economic plans may impact the country’s debt trajectory.

A large chunk of the troubled assets are on the balance sheet of Dexia Credit Local, a French unit. Dexia Credit Local carries most of the bank’s 95 billion-euro bond portfolio, which includes 21 billion euros of Greek, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish and Irish sovereign debt. Dexia’s municipal lending units in Italy and Spain, which it agreed to dispose of to win European Commission approval for its 2008 bailout, are also on the French unit’s balance sheet.

“The fair distribution of the burden is a very sensitive and crucial element in the negotiations,” Belgian Prime Minister Yves Leterme said on RTL radio on Oct. 6. “To save Dexia, we need a fair division of responsibility.”

Local Units

Belgium plans to nationalize Dexia Bank Belgium NV, Leterme told labor unions on Oct. 7, according to ACV-CSC, a workers’ union. Leterme has said he’ll do whatever it takes to safeguard the bank.

Dexia said on Oct. 6 that an investor is interested in its profitable retail and private banking unit in Luxembourg. Belgian daily L’Echo reported that a Qatari sovereign wealth fund was in discussions to buy the unit, Dexia Banque Internationale a Luxembourg, for 900 million euros, without saying where it got the information.

That announcement set off concern that Dexia’s most valuable assets will be sold at fire-sale prices to international buyers in response to a temporary funding squeeze.

Groep Arco, Dexia’s second-biggest Belgian shareholder, said on Oct. 6 that it “opposes a forced sale of good units of the group at very low prices to foreign entities.”

‘Restore Calm’

In France, state-owned CDC and La Banque Postale may join with Dexia to create a new company to take over the French municipal lending arm, according to a statement on Oct. 6 from a postal union, whose representatives attended a board meeting where the plan was presented. Paris-based La Poste, the parent of Banque Postale, declined to comment, as did CDC and Dexia.

“Dexia is not an isolated problem,” said Rabo’s Kluis. “The question for all investors in Europe is how politicians are going to handle this, and what they want to see is a coordinated and professional solution. That would be a good opportunity to restore calm.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Fabio Benedetti-Valentini in Paris at fabiobv@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Frank Connelly at fconnelly@bloomberg.net

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AT&T: IPhone 4S Preorders Broke Sales Records

By Adam Satariano - Oct 8, 2011 7:08 AM GMT+0700

AT&T Inc. (T) received more than 200,000 preorders for the iPhone 4S in 12 hours, marking the company’s most successful debut yet for the Apple Inc. (AAPL) device.

There has been “extraordinary demand” for the new iPhone, the Dallas-based carrier said today in a statement. AT&T, along with Verizon Wireless and Sprint Nextel Corp. (S), provide service for the phone.

The rush of orders signals that there’s pent-up demand for the new model, which followed the previous version by 16 months -- longer than usual. Apple unveiled the iPhone 4S at a press conference earlier this week, pricing it at $199, $299 and $399, depending on the features. The device comes with new voice- command features and a higher-resolution camera.

It also has an A5 chip that will make graphics seven times faster than the old processor and an “intelligent antenna system” for improved call quality. The phone works with both CDMA and GSM wireless standards, and users will have up to 8 hours of talk time on one charge.

The new model will be the first Apple product release since the Oct. 5 death of co-founder Steve Jobs. The iPhone represents the company’s biggest source of revenue, accounting for nearly half of its sales. For the first time, the device is available from all three of the largest U.S. carriers. The other two, Verizon and Sprint, haven’t disclosed preorder sales.

Shares of Cupertino, California-based Apple fell $7.57, or 2 percent, to $369.80 today. The stock has risen 15 percent this year.

To contact the reporter on this story: Adam Satariano in San Francisco at asatariano1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Tom Giles at tgiles5@bloomberg.net

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Bank of America Hands Krawcheck $6 Million Severance Following Her Ouster

By Hugh Son - Oct 8, 2011 11:00 AM GMT+0700

Bank of America Corp. (BAC), the lender seeking to trim expenses by eliminating at least 30,000 jobs, will pay former wealth-management division head Sallie L. Krawcheck $6 million after her dismissal last month.

That sum includes one year of her former salary, or $850,000, and a one-time payment of $5.15 million to be awarded in 2012, the Charlotte, North Carolina-based bank said yesterday in a filing. Joseph Price, whose position was also eliminated, gets a $5 million package, the bank said.

Chief Executive Officer Brian T. Moynihan ousted Krawcheck and Price in September as part of his effort to streamline the biggest U.S. bank amid mortgage-related losses and a 56 percent share decline this year. His target is to reduce annual costs at consumer banking units by $5 billion, mostly through job cuts.

“This is yet another story about a corporate executive getting significant amounts of money after they’ve left their employer,” said Richard Lipstein, a managing director for headhunter Boyden Global Executive Search. “She was part of a restructuring that eliminated a layer of management; at her level, there are certain obligations that have to be fulfilled if you leave for non-cause.”

Price, 50, ran consumer banking and credit cards. Just like Krawcheck, 46, he will get $850,000 in installment payments, and his one-time award of $4.15 million is contingent upon not breaching a contract with the lender.

The executives agreed to release Bank of America from claims, and to refrain from competing with the firm, soliciting employees or luring away customers for one year. They will receive health care benefits until the agreement expires in 2012, the bank said.

Krawcheck also stepped down from the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority’s board of governors, said Nancy Condon, a spokeswoman for the brokerage-industry watchdog, declining to elaborate.

To contact the reporter on this story: Hugh Son in New York at hson1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: David Scheer at dscheer@bloomberg.net

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