Business Highlights

The United Auto Workers union reached a tentative four-year contract with Chrysler Wednesday, hours after going out on strike and the same day General Motors workers ratified a separate four-year pact.

Next up: Ford.

UAW President Ron Gettelfinger said the strike against Chrysler LLC, 80.1 percent owned by private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management LP, would end immediately and workers should report for their next available shift.

Gettelfinger wouldn't release any details of the contract, but Chrysler said the tentative agreement includes the establishment of a UAW-managed trust that will administer retiree health care. The newly private company didn't say how much money it will contribute to the trust.

The UAW said its historic contract with GM, which also includes a retiree health care trust, was approved by 66 percent of production workers and 64 percent of skilled trades workers.

The deal, reached Sept. 26 after a two-day nationwide strike, establishes lower pay for some workers and makes promises for future work at U.S. plants.

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CHICAGO (AP) _ Boeing Co. has long promised that its 787 Dreamliner will fly faster and farther than any other medium-sized jet, use 20 percent less fuel and offer increased cabin comfort.

Now the first all-new American commercial jetliner in more than a decade also will be at least six months late.

Acknowledging that early problems assembling the first 787 have disrupted its schedule, the aerospace company said Wednesday it is delaying initial deliveries of the ballyhooed aircraft by six months. Instead of next May, the first deliveries are now targeted for late November or December 2008.

The first test flight, already pushed back once from the initial target of early this fall, now is not anticipated until around the end of the first quarter of 2008.

The delay highlights inherent problems in building new airplanes and could slow the momentum Boeing built up after years of lagging behind European rival Airbus, which itself stumbled in introducing its superjumbo A380 two years behind schedule.

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NEW YORK (AP) _ Wall Street stumbled through a lopsided session Wednesday, closing mixed as profit warnings and news from blue chip names Alcoa Inc. and Boeing Co. dragged down the Dow Jones industrial average but largely spared technology stocks.

A pullback was to be expected after the Dow and the Standard & Poor's 500 index finished at new highs Tuesday amid enthusiasm over comments from Federal Reserve policymakers about interest rates, but corporate news appeared to hasten Wednesday's slide.

Declines by Dow components Boeing and Alcoa, among others, hurt the 30-stock index. Meanwhile, International Paper Co. and Chevron Corp. moved lower on profit news.

With investors thumbing through fresh quarterly results and corporate announcements, the latest economic readings did little to dislodge the dichotomy between blue chips and tech stocks. A report showed inventories among U.S. wholesalers ticked up in August, while a trade group for real estate agents warned the drop in sales of existing homes this year will be steeper than had been expected.

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SEATTLE (AP) _ Shares of Costco Wholesale Corp. soared Wednesday after the warehouse club retailer reported a 5 percent jump in its fiscal fourth-quarter earnings, driven by a rebound in same-store sales growth, cost-cutting and a tighter returns policy for electronics.

The company also expressed optimism about fiscal 2008, saying earnings per share for the full year may come in higher than current Wall Street estimates.

Net income for the 16 weeks ended Sept. 2 rose to $372.4 million, or 83 cents per share, compared with $355.6 million, or 75 cents per share, a year earlier. Results were hurt by a one-time charge of $35.8 million, or 8 cents per share, reflecting a change in how the company accounts for deferred membership fee revenue.

Excluding the charge, earnings were $408.2 million, or 91 cents per share, well above the 83 cents per share consensus estimate of analysts polled by Thomson Financial.

Quarterly revenue grew 3 percent to $20.48 billion from $19.88 billion, missing Wall Street's estimate of $20.73 billion.

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LAS VEGAS (AP) _ MGM Mirage Inc. said Wednesday it will spend up to $5 billion to build a massive casino resort whose three towers will dominate the Atlantic City skyline and lift the level of luxury in a city hit hard by competition from slots parlors across the Northeast.

The 3,000-room resort, planned to open in 2012, is part of a gamble by casino operators to reverse what is expected to be the first decline in casino revenue in Atlantic City in 29 years by polishing its image in an attempt to lure more affluent visitors.

The MGM Grand Atlantic City will be built on a 72-acre site next to MGM Mirage's joint venture with Boyd Gaming Corp., the Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa, which has led the market since it opened in 2003.

The project also expands the company's use of its MGM Grand brand, which began in Las Vegas in 1973, branched out last week in Detroit and is set for development in Macau this year and in 2008 at Foxwoods in Connecticut, run by the Mashantucket Pequot Tribe.

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NEW ORLEANS (AP) _ Shaw Group Inc., an engineering and construction services provider, posted a third-quarter profit on Wednesday, citing strong demand for power generation capacity and petrochemicals processing.

The results beat Wall Street expectations, and Shaw Group shares rose more than 8 percent in afternoon trading.

The company earned $54.6 million, or 67 cents per share, in the three months ended May 31 versus a loss of $16.7 million, or 21 cents per share, posted in the prior-year quarter.

The results include $5.7 million, or 7 cents a share, from the company's acquisition a year ago of 20 percent interest in Westinghouse Electric, a service provider for nuclear plants.

Revenue increased to $1.6 billion from $1.2 billion in the third quarter of 2006.

Analysts polled by Thomson Financial expected earnings per share of 40 cents before one-time items on revenue of $1.55 billion.

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SAN FRANCISCO (AP) _ A federal judge on Wednesday granted a request by labor and civil liberties organizations to temporarily block the U.S. government from proceeding with a program to crack down on businesses that may be employing illegal immigrants.

U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer said the Social Security Administration and the Department of Homeland Security could not go ahead with their plan to send joint letters warning businesses they'll face penalties if they keep workers whose Social Security numbers don't match their names.

Breyer said the new work-site rule would likely impose hardships on businesses and their workers. Employers would incur new costs to comply with the regulation that the government hasn't evaluated, and innocent workers unable to correct mistakes in their records in the given time would lose their jobs, the judge wrote.

The so-called "no match" letters, including a Department of Homeland Security warning, were supposed to start going out in September but were held after labor groups and immigrant activists filed a federal lawsuit.

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CLARKSBURG, W.Va. (AP) _ DuPont Co. must provide medical monitoring for about 7,000 residents who were exposed to arsenic, cadmium and lead contamination from a waste site at a former Harrison County smelter, a jury said Wednesday.

The verdict came in the second phase of the trial of a class-action lawsuit filed by 10 residents of Spelter who accused DuPont of deliberately dumping dangerous heavy metals on an industrial site there.

The jury found that DuPont must finance medical monitoring for the next 40 years, said Mike Papantonio, who represents the residents.

"This provides some security for families and their children that DuPont was unwilling to voluntarily provide," he said in a prepared statement.

DuPont spokesman Tim Ireland said the company will continue to defend itself.

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By The Associated Press

The Dow fell 85.84, or 0.61 percent, to 14,078.69 after rising 120 points on Tuesday.

Broader stock indicators were mixed. The S&P 500 fell 2.68, or 0.17 percent, to 1,562.47, and the technology-laden Nasdaq composite index rose 7.70, or 0.27 percent, to 2,811.61.

Light, sweet crude for November delivery rose $1.04 to settle at $81.30 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. November gasoline rose 1.34 cents to settle at $2.0336 a gallon while Nymex heating oil rose 3.19 cents to settle at $2.2172 a gallon.

November natural gas rose 14.7 cents to settle at $7.01 per 1,000 cubic feet on expectations that this winter will be colder than last.

In London, November Brent crude rose $1.11 to settle at $78.60 a barrel on the ICE Futures exchange.