BUSINESS NOTES.

ECONOMY SURGES ON SALES: Record sales of existing homes and surging demand for semiconductors and other electronic components in August paint a picture of an economy that continues to expand robustly.

Meanwhile, 2,000 fewer Americans filed applications for unemployment benefits last week, suggesting the nation's jobless rate remained near a 24-year low this month.

All three reports depicted greater economic strength than analysts predicted. They upset the inflation-sensitive bond market. The stock market, at first relatively unscathed, fell too.

?13- Associated Press 

WIRELESS COMPANIES GET HELP: Cash-strapped companies that bid billions for wireless phone licenses and now can't pay will get some relief under a plan adopted by federal regulators.

The Federal Communications Commission's action Thursday came after six months of difficult negotiations that pitted three commissioners - Susan Ness, Rachelle Chong and James Quello - against Chairman Reed Hundt over how much relief the bidders should be given. He favored giving more and ended up dissenting on one part of the plan.

The goal is to give some relief to cash-strapped bidders so that they can move ahead on building their networks and give consumers more choices in buying mobile phones and other services.

?13- Associated Press

KODAK CUTS 200 JOBS: To halt a slide in profits and counter heightened competition from Japan's Fuji Photo Film, Eastman Kodak Co. said it will begin carving costs by eliminating at least 200 management jobs.

In a memo to 95,000 employees Thursday, Kodak said a unit-by-unit overhaul that Wall Street analysts say could bring thousands of layoffs will start at the top with a 20 percent reduction among some 1,000 senior and middle managers.

Rattled by a film-price war at home and reined in by the dollar's surge abroad, the world's biggest photographic products company said last week that its 1997 profits could be as much as 25 percent lower than a year ago.

?13- Associated Press

BRITISH BREW LOOKS PALE: The beer market hasn't totally gone flat, but some of Britain's brewers are staring pretty grimly at the bottom of the glass.

The troubles of their rapidly changing industry were highlighted Thursday when the giant beer maker Carlsberg-Tetley said it would close or sell three of its five breweries and eliminate 1,500 jobs - or 40 percent of its work force.

The gloom spread to the London Stock Exchange, where disappointing business at more beer companies pushed their stocks down about 2 percent.

?13- Associated Press

ICAHN TO START FILM VENTURE: Financier Carl Icahn plans to start a film distribution company in New York. Icahn said the company, Stratosphere Entertainment, would begin with a $50 million investment and be run by Paul Cohen, an executive with extensive experience in independent film, if not a particularly strong financial record. The move into movies is part of an expansion into the entertainment business for Icahn, who recently acquired Marvel Entertainment and Stratosphere Corp., which owns a bankrupt casino in Las Vegas. But he is better known as the corporate raider who made successful runs at Trans World Airways in 1988 and RJR Nabisco in 1995. He plans to formally announce the film venture on Oct. 7.

?13- The New York Times