Business news for Thu, 29 Nov 2007 & with word plan. 30 news.

Stanley Ho's SJM has almost halved the funding target for its IPO as the Macau casino operator seeks to revive its stalled Hong Kong listing plan.

Money Magazine's Walter Updegrave talks about why it's important to plan your savings now, so you can retire comfortably later.

Apple plans to unveil a new version of its iPhone handset next year with faster download speeds, according to AT&T, Apple's US mobile partner - news that comes at an awkward time for Apple

Pep Boys is coming off a lousy third quarter, but there is a plan in place for a turnaround. Should investors buy in?

Solutia Inc. will finally emerge from Chapter 11 bankruptcy in about a month after four years thanks to U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Prudence Beatty's confirmation Thursday in New York of Soutia's business reorganization plan , according to a St. Louis lawyer working for the bankruptcy committee.

In riding to the rescue of E-Trade, Citadel Investment has trampled the troubled brokerage's existing shareholders

Boards shouldn't wait until they have a crisis to deal with who's up next. The issue must always be top of mind—and top of agenda

On Wednesday, I broke the news that California is weighing a plan to hand off the hosting of e-mails--to, from, and between state workers--to either Google or Microsoft. Is everybody comfortable with that?

The Bush administration and the mortgage industry, trying to combat a massive wave of foreclosures, are hammering out a proposal to temporarily freeze interest rates on certain troubled subprime mortgages. If adopted, it would be the biggest action taken to cope with the unfolding crisis.

PING An Insurance (Group) Co said today it paid 1.81 billion euros (US$2.7 billion) to become the second biggest shareholder of Fortis, marking the biggest overseas investment by a Chinese insurer. Shenzhen-based Ping An bought a 4.2 percent stake, or 95.01 million shares, in Fortis, Belgium's biggest financial company, on the Euronext Brussels and Euronext Amsterdam stock exchanges as of Tuesday, the insurer said in a statement today. The two companies also signed a memorandum of understanding on Wednesday, which enables Ping An to appoint a non-executive director to Fortis. The purchase is in line with Ping An's global assets investments plan. Ping An is seeking to diversify by assembling a one-stop financial supermarket that will get two-thirds of its revenue from banking, securities and asset management. Ping An's shares ended at 109.98 yuan today in Shanghai, a gain of 7.45 percent. The benchmark Shanghai Composite Index rose 4.16 percent to 5,003.33 today.

The City Council approved a proposal at its Wednesday meeting allowing seven-day beer and wine sales, but must hear the proposal again at its next meeting before the issue is put to the voters.

Interpublic today will make public a plan for improving the operating efficiencies and cross-agency collaboration of its two global media networks - Initiative and Universal McCann - that has already begun ruffling some feathers in some outposts, and is fueling speculation that it will lead to a consolidation of the two brands. That speculation is being driven in part by the fact that Interpublic has tapped Nick Brien, the brash CEO of Universal McCann, to lead the initiative, and to head a task force that will implement changes that are likely to include the consolidation of management functions in at least some offices.

It has been nearly a year since Andover-based Vornado -- which designs and assembles fans, heaters, humidifiers and air purifiers -- got a new owner and new management. The head of the company's new management team, former Coleman Co. chief executive Bill Phillips, said Vornado officials have plans to make the company a lot bigger than it is today. It's a plan that, if successful, will take Vornado in the next five years from a company with sales in the tens of millions of dollars to hundreds of millions of dollars, said Phillips, Vornado's president and chief executive. The plan drawn up by Phillips and his management team -- which includes former Coleman employees Drew Jones and Randy Brillhart -- calls for the development of new and sophisticated products over the next few years that will be sold to a much broader base of customers, markets and countries. But it has taken a few months to get to this point.

An agreement on further peace talks, if not much else THEY almost didn't make it, but in the last hour Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister, and Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, agreed on a joint statement. Four months of preliminary talks had failed to produce what Mr Abbas and Condoleezza Rice, the American secretary of state, had hoped to brandish at this week's peace summit in Annapolis: an agreement to predetermine some aspects of the final-status deal that would ultimately create a Palestinian state next to Israel. In the end, Ms Rice had to settle for less, but the Palestinians and Israelis did agree two things. Final-status talks will begin on December 12th. And the United States will monitor both sides' compliance in the meantime with the "road map" peace plan of 2003, under which Israel is meant to freeze settlement-building in the West Bank while the Palestinian Authority (PA) takes action against militants who attack Israel. Both these agreements still lack some important detail, however. While teams of negotiators will work continuously to hammer out all the issues of a peace deal--the borders of the Palestinian state, the division of Jerusalem, the fate of 4.5m Palestinian refugees abroad, the sharing of water resources, and so on--nobody has specified whether the starting point will be a blank slate or a previous near-deal such as the informal 2001 Taba agreement negotiated in Egypt. That could make a big difference to how fast things progress. So too could the fact that there will be no American go-between for them. ...

Last week we said that the Fair Tax plan endorsed by Mike Huckabee would involve rebates "to those who need them". In fact, they would go to all families on spending up to the federal poverty level. Sorry. ...

LONDON (MarketWatch) -- Fred's Inc. said that third-quarter net income dipped to $4.6 million, or 12 cents a share, from $6.0 million, or 15 cents a share, a year ago. Analysts had been expecting earnings to total 14 cents a share, according to data compiled by Thomson Financial. Sales at the general merchandise store chain rose 3% to $419.9 million, after comparable store sales rose 1.2%. The company said that $1.5 million of costs orginally intended for the fourth quarter were brought forward into the third quarter. "This timing shift will benefit previously forecast fourth quarter earnings by 2 cents a share and, consequently, will not affect our full-year plan. "Early indications from our holiday sales, while strong in the new expansion departments, thus far show that consumers remain conservative in spending," the firm said.

NEW YORK (AP) - Leading news organizations and other publishers seeking greater control over how their Web sites are indexed and displayed by search engines have developed a plan to inject more flexibility into an existing system for restricting access.

Genentech's plan to restrict the availability of Avastin so doctors can't use it instead of a more expensive medicine for eye disease will cost taxpayers $1 billion to $3 billion annually, according to Sen.

The agency is poised to approve a plan by Chairman Kevin Martin to waive for two years a rule barring ownership of a newspaper and a broadcast property in one market. Federal regulators are poised to approve Tribune Co.'s $8.2-billion deal to go private by the end of the week, clearing the way for the transaction to close by Dec. 31.

Following the Abu Dhabi investment authority taking a stake in Citi, sovereign wealth funds have moved centre stage again. The New York Times reports that the Chinese plan to avoid controversial overseas investment with their $200bn plus fund and instead concentrate on bolstering their own banking system.