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Byline: - Staff and Wire Services

Guitar Center Inc. Q4 revenues soar

WESTLAKE VILLAGE - Sales of six-strings sent Guitar Center Inc.'s fourth-quarter revenues soaring, as the retailer announced an 18.5 percent increase in grosses Wednesday. Overall, the company sold $468.9 million worth of goods, compared with $395.8 million the year before. At its flagship Guitar Center locations, same-store sales increased 10 percent.

Based on the better-than-expected performance, the company upped its fourth-quarter earnings per share guidance to the $0.89-to-$0.92 range from its previous guidance of $0.80-to-$0.88. Full fourth-quarter and 2004 results will be reported Feb. 9.

NYC hospital head is going to Kaiser

NEW YORK - City hospitals chief Dr. Benjamin Chu is resigning to become an executive with the health care company Kaiser-Permanente, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said Wednesday.

Chu will become president of the Southern California region for Kaiser-Permanente, overseeing an $11 billion budget.

He will leave the city Health & Hospitals Corp. effective Feb. 15.

As president and CEO of the Health & Hospitals Corp., Chu oversaw 20 city-run hospitals and medical centers that serve 1.2 million New Yorkers each year, about 450,000 of them uninsured.

Wal-Mart settles gun-sale lawsuit

SACRAMENTO - Wal-Mart Stores agreed to pay $14.5 million in fines and other costs to settle a state lawsuit over thousands of gun-sale violations at California stores between 2000 and 2003, Attorney General Bill Lockyer announced Wednesday.

Lockyer said the Arkansas retailer will pay $5 million in fines, $4 million for state compliance checks with gun laws and a million more to assure that its stores meet state and federal firearms laws.

Wal-Mart agreed in April 2003 to suspend gun sales at its sporting goods counters in 114 California stores after the state documented hundreds of violations at two stores in Sacramento and four other stores in Turlock, Merced, Los Banos and Madera.

A subsequent investigation by California Department of Justice officials uncovered 2,891 more violations between 2000 and 2003 at stores in Fresno, Folsom, Turlock, Ukiah and Simi Valley.