BRIEFCASE.Byline: - Staff and Wire Services Short-term rates on T-bills mixed WASHINGTON - Interest rates on short-term Treasury bills were mixed in Monday's auction with the three-month bill dipping to the lowest level in three weeks. The Treasury Department auctioned $18 billion in three-month bills at a discount rate of 3.900 percent, down from 3.940 percent last week. An additional $16 billion in six-month bills was auctioned at a discount rate of 4.155 percent, unchanged from last week. In a separate report, the Federal Reserve said Monday that the average yield for one-year Treasury bills, a popular index for making changes in adjustable-rate mortgages, fell to 4.30 percent last week from 4.36 percent the previous week. High court to hear eBay patent case WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court said Monday that it will take a patent case involving eBay Inc. and a small Virginia business. A federal appeals court had said eBay's fixed-price auctions and some of its online payment methods violated a patent obtained by MercExchange in Great Falls Great Falls, city (1990 pop. 55,097), seat of Cascade co., N central Mont., second largest city in the state, at the confluence of the Missouri and Sun rivers and near the falls that give the city its name; inc. 1888. , Va. A judge had ordered San Jose-based eBay to pay $29.5 million in lost licensing fees and damages. The Supreme Court will hear eBay's appeal next spring. Meanwhile, a bill in Congress, inspired in part by this case, would make it harder for patent-holders to get court orders to stop the sale of products that potentially infringe on their patents. Pharmaceuticals merger in works SCHAUMBURG, Ill. - American Pharmaceutical Partners Inc. said Monday that it is buying its largest shareholder, privately held American BioScience Inc., for stock worth about $4.1 billion, creating a biopharmaceutical company with annual revenue of more than $500 million. The new company will be named Abraxis BioScience and will have worldwide rights to cancer treatment Abraxane, which is marketed in the United States United States, officially United States of America, republic (2005 est. pop. 295,734,000), 3,539,227 sq mi (9,166,598 sq km), North America. The United States is the world's third largest country in population and the fourth largest country in area. for metastatic Metastatic The term used to describe a secondary cancer, or one that has spread from one area of the body to another. Mentioned in: Coagulation Disorders metastatic pertaining to or of the nature of a metastasis. breast cancer and is being developed for other breast, lung, ovarian, prostate, melanoma and head and neck cancers in more than 74 clinical trials, including seven Phase III Noun 1. phase III - a large clinical trial of a treatment or drug that in phase I and phase II has been shown to be efficacious with tolerable side effects; after successful conclusion of these clinical trials it will receive formal approval from the FDA studies. Patrick Soon-Shiong, currently executive chairman of American Pharmaceutical and chief executive officer of American BioScience, will be chairman and CEO (1) (Chief Executive Officer) The highest individual in command of an organization. Typically the president of the company, the CEO reports to the Chairman of the Board. of the new company. Al Heller has stepped down as American Pharmaceutical's chief executive and from the company's board of directors. Constellation ups its bid for Vincor ROCHESTER, N.Y. - Constellation Brands Constellation Brands, Inc., headquartered in Fairport, New York, is a leading international producer and marketer of beverage alcohol brands with a broad portfolio across the wine, imported beer and spirits categories. Inc., the world's biggest wine company, said Monday that it was raising its hostile takeover Hostile Takeover A takeover attempt that is strongly resisted by the target firm. Notes: Hostile takeovers are usually bad news, as the employee moral of the target firm can quickly turn to animosity against the acquiring firm. bid for Canadian winemaker Vincor International Inc. by more than 6 percent, to $1 billion, but said the Vincor board had rejected an even higher offer. While encouraged by Constellation's revised proposals, Vincor's management rejected them as inadequate. Constellation called its latest bid of $28.19 a share in cash as its ``best and final offer.'' It is a 48 percent premium over Vincor's closing share price on the Toronto Stock Exchange Toronto Stock Exchange (TSE) Canada's largest stock exchange, trading approximately 1,200 company stocks and 33 options. on Sept. 8, the day before Constellation first proposed an acquisition. The offer is up from its Oct. 18 bid of $26.45 a share, or about $939 million. That bid was due to expire Monday, and the new one will expire Dec. 8. Federated Connected and treated as one. See federated database and federated directories. agrees to settle charges ALBANY, N.Y. - Federated Investors Inc., one of the nation's largest investment managers, has agreed to pay $100 million to settle state and federal charges that it allowed favored clients to benefit from mutual fund trades at the expense of other investors, New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of Attorney General Eliot Spitzer and U.S. regulators said Monday. Founded in 1955, Pittsburgh-based Federated is one of the nation's largest investment managers with assets under management Assets Under Management (AUM) is a term used by financial services companies in the mutual fund and money management or investment management business to gauge how much money they are managing. of more than $207 billion, according to the firm's Web site. Federated is the 14th firm to settle improper mutual fund trading charges since Spitzer's case against the Canary Capital Partners firm in 2003. |
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