BUSINESS BRIEFS
Home sales up slightly, but 2007 still a bleak year
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Sales of previously owned homes edged up in November, but that didn't improve the broader picture of a feeble housing market racked by record-high foreclosures and harder-to-get credit.
The National Association of Realtors reported yesterday that sales of existing single-family homes, condominiums and townhouses rose 0.4 percent in November from October, to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5 million units.
Even with the small increase, the pace of sales was still the second-lowest on record going back to 1999. The lowest pace — 4.98 million — was registered in October.
CINCINNATI POST ENDS PUBLICATION
CINCINNATI — Once, Greater Cincinnati and neighboring Northern Kentucky had 13 daily newspapers — eight in English, five in German. After the final edition of the Cincinnati Post went to press at 9:25 a.m. yesterday, there was only one.
Changing reading habits and lifestyles led to the Post's demise and the end of a nearly 127-year run for the afternoon newspaper.
The journalism lingo "-30-" meaning the last sheet, word, or line of copy, topped the front page of the Post's farewell edition.
Then friends, family and former co-workers poured into the fifth-floor newsroom of the downtown Cincinnati building on Court Street one last time.
"It's not festive exactly, but it's not a funeral either," said Post Editor Mike Philipps, a camera slung over his shoulder.
OIL ENDS THE YEAR TRADING NEAR HIGH
NEW YORK — Oil prices ended the year near $96 a barrel, or 57 percent higher than where they began, and analysts expect rising demand and geopolitical instability to keep upward pressure on energy costs early in 2008.
"There's a good chance this week that we'll see some record highs," Jim Ritterbusch, president of Ritterbusch and Associates in Galena, Ill., said. A record-breaking year for energy futures ended quietly yesterday, with oil futures declining 2 cents to settle at $95.98 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
Oil reached a trading record of $99.29 on Nov. 21 and remains close to the range of inflation-adjusted highs set in early 1980. Depending on how the adjustment is calculated, $38 a barrel then would be worth $96 to $103 or more today.
CHINA EASING SECURITIES BAN
BEIJING — Beijing is easing a ban on foreign investment in the securities industry but ensuring Chinese control by limiting investors from abroad to minority stakes.
A foreign investor may own no more than 20 percent of a Chinese securities firm, and total foreign ownership of any firm is limited to 25 percent, the China Securities Regulatory Commission said on its Web site.
Each securities firm must also have a Chinese owner with at least a 33 percent stake, the ministry said in a statement dated Saturday, ensuring the dominant shareholder is Chinese.
ZYRTEC AVAILABLE AS GENERIC DRUG
TRENTON, N.J. — Allergy sufferers who take the popular prescription medication Zyrtec are getting several new options that don't require a prescription.
Yesterday, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration gave approval for Ohm Laboratories Inc. of North Brunswick to sell generic versions of New York-based Pfizer Inc.'s Zyrtec. The antihistamine, which doesn't make takers sleepy, generated about $1.3 billion in annual sales but lost patent protection in late December.
Ohm will sell the drug without a prescription under its chemical name, cetirizine hydrochloride, in 5 and 10 milligram doses.
The medicine treats hives and allergy symptoms such as runny nose, sneezing and itching of the nose, throat and eyes.
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