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The parent company of Hawaiian Electric Co. and American Savings Bank posted lower earnings for fiscal 2009 compared to 2008.

Hawaiian Electric Industries (NYSE: HEI) reported a profit of $102.3 million for fiscal 2009, an 18.7 percent decrease from the $125.9 million it earned in fiscal 2008.

That figure, however, includes $19.3 million in after-tax charges related to a previous sale of the bank’s mortgage-related securities portfolio.

Total revenue was down for the year to $2.3 billion, compared to $3.2 billion the previous year.

HEI attributed the decrease to lower kilowatt-hour sales at its electric utilities, increases in utility operations and bank credit expenses.

“It was a challenging year and we made difficult decisions to curb spending and reduce risk, while continuing to progress forward with long-term strategic initiatives to move Hawaii toward a clean-energy future and improved performance and profitability at both our utility and bank,” said Constance Lau, HEI president and CEO, in a prepared statement payday advance.

Electric utility earnings were $79.4 million for the year, compared to $92 million the previous year. Kilowatt-hour sales were off 2.5 percent while operating expenses increased by $5.3 million.

Income from American Savings Bank was up 22 percent for the year to $21.8 million. But, the company said adjusted net income from the bank was $41.1 million and $53.4 million in 2009 and 2008, respectively, a 23 percent decrease for the year. The non-adjusted figures include the after-tax charge in 2009 and a balance sheet restructuring charge in 2008.

“Like many banks across the country, our bank was affected by the economic pressures in 2009,” Lau said. “However, as we have done throughout the economic crisis, we kept capital healthy and depositors’ money safe.”

Shares of Hawaiian Electric Industries stock were up 1.4 percent to $42.78 on Thursday.

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When officials at the St. Patrick Center hatched the idea of shifting some of the center’s resources from the homeless to a support group for the recently unemployed, they estimated an effort serving perhaps 600 people for maybe a few months.

That was a year ago.

Today, the result of the center’s brainstorm — the Go! Network — boasts a membership database of 2,400 names (and counting). It has an open-ended commitment to continue serving the unemployed until the so-called jobless recession runs its course. And its organizers hope to expand it to other cities.

"To me, it’s been life-changing," said Caren Libby of Wildwood, who started attending Go! Network meetings after leaving her part-time job more than a year ago.

"Go! Network has given me the opportunity to utilize social media and make contacts."

Libby had been doing promotions for UniGroup Inc. in Fenton when she started seeing hints that her job was about to be eliminated or its hours sharply cut. Now, she has almost enough freelance marketing work to qualify as a full-time businesswoman, she says. Her business grew substantially after she volunteered to do marketing work for Go! Network.

"That helped me tremendously to grow my skills," she said, and helped her meet business contacts she wouldn’t otherwise have encountered.

In fact, Go! Network’s concept has proven so successful that St. Patrick and the internal subsidiary overseeing it, Celtic Creative, are actively pursuing public and private funding that would expand the program to six other U.S. cities: Cincinnati, Louisville, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Columbus and Memphis.

Dan Buck, the executive director of the center, said the model — giving employees displaced from professional positions a place to meet and address the myriad problems associated with joblessness — will work elsewhere.

"Outside of professional organizations, there (are few) community-driven comprehensive networks for out-of-work professionals," he said.

Buck and Chuck Aranda, the head of Celtic Creative, acknowledge they were unsure what lay ahead as they set the groundwork for the Go! Network on a budget of $200,000 in late 2008.

What they did know is that the recession, then reaching full speed, demanded some sort of response.

"Personally, we all knew somebody who was hurting," Buck said.

And he figured St. Patrick Center, with its track record of creating employment opportunities for the homeless, was in a good position to do something about it.

"We were finding a lot of people in this position who didn’t know where to go or what to do," Aranda said.

"They needed a professional environment."

Buck and Aranda figured on 100 or so showing up at the group’s first meeting, in early February 2009 — barely a month after the idea for the support group was first broached.

The 200-plus who spilled into the St. Patrick auditorium were the first clue of what lay ahead.

Aranda and Buck are quick to deflect credit for the Go! Network’s popularity and successes.

Much of the funding, they note, has come from corporate sources (including Anheuser-Busch) with a big boost from the United Way.

In the same manner, it is the members themselves who determine the focus of each Tuesday’s meetings and the topics addressed — many dealing with the financial and emotional toll of unemployment — in small group settings.

"St. Patrick Center didn’t drive the train," Buck said. "We just created the track."

Since last February, that line has brought 118 human resources executives from 46 area companies to Go! Network functions. Academics, mental health professionals and others have also paid visits.

So far, what Buck calls a "connector system for multi-skilled professionals" has played a part in helping 26 percent of the group’s members land jobs.

"What’s unique about this is the community response," Aranda said. "It shows what can happen when a combination of stakeholders in a community come together to help this population."

It’s time, he and Buck say, that other communities hard-hit by the economy have the same opportunity.

Buck flew last month to Washington where he met with Rep. William Lacy Clay, D-St. Louis, and U.S. Department of Labor officials about establishing Go! Networks — or variations there-of — in Kansas City and the five other cities.

Aranda and Buck said the St. Patrick Center would provide the wherewithal, the infrastructure and the existing Go! Network website (GoNetworkSTL.com) as a template.

The government would provide funding, perhaps from the Federal Recovery Act. The United Way, Buck said, has already expressed a willingness to join forces with St. Patrick in setting up programs in the six other urban areas.

Aranda stressed the networks in all cities will follow the lead of St. Louis by emphasizing the creation of new jobs by promoting start-up entrepreneurial efforts.

Whether the Go! Network lands one other city or all six on the wish list, Aranda said the objective will remain as clear as it is simple: "It’s responding to the needs and helping the people themselves respond to those needs in a difficult time."

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Gold prices plunged Thursday as the dollar surged against the euro amid concerns about the economic health of certain European nations.

February gold fell $28, or 2.5%, to settle at $1,107.40 an ounce after falling to a low of $1,098 an ounce earlier in the session. The retreat came two weeks after gold settled at an all-time high of $1,218.30 an ounce.

Carlos Sanchez, a precious metals analyst at CPM Group in New York, said the selloff was "definitely attributable to the stronger dollar, and some stop-loss selling."

The dollar jumped 1.3% against the euro to $1.4346, its highest level since early September. The euro came under pressure after Standard & Poors downgraded Greece’s credit rating, raising concerns about the health of other strained euro zone economies like Ireland.

A stronger dollar tends to weigh on the price of gold, since the precious metal is traded in U.S. dollars around the world.

The buck was also supported by a Wednesday statement from the Federal Reserve that said U personal loan for poor credit.S. economic conditions continue to improve, even as the central bank held interest rates near historic lows.

Sanchez said a firm move below $1,100 an ounce could pave the way for a brief retreat toward a range near $1,050 an ounce. However, he expects the weakness to be short lived.

Gold, which has gained about 24% this year, has been on a tear over the last few months as the dollar has weakened substantially.

While the dollar has regained ground in recent days, many traders expect gold prices to push higher into next year amid strong investor interest and the outlook for low U.S. interest rates.

In a research report out Thursday, analysts at Morgan Stanley raised their forecast for gold prices next year by 20% to $1,200 an ounce. The investment bank also raised the outlook for 2011, but reduced forecasts from 2013 onwards.  

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Otterbein Homes has acquired Pioneer Home Health Care, a Medicare-certified home health agency with operations in the Wilmington area.

Pioneer Home Health Care was established in 2005 by licensed physical therapists Tim McCormick and Kimberly Neikirk. Neikirk has been named executive director for the new venture for Otterbein, and McCormick will assume the position of therapy supervisor.

All of the other current employees will remain with the company, according to a press release.

Otterbein’s five full-service retirement communities in western and northern Ohio are located in Lebanon, St. Marys, Cridersville, Pemberville and on the Marblehead Peninsula on Lake Erie. Avalon by Otterbein neighborhoods, which offer skilled nursing and rehabilitation, are located in Perrysburg and Monclova in northern Ohio and Springboro and Middletown in southern Ohio Same day payday loans.

Avalon in Hamilton Township is under construction.

Jill Hreben, CEO of Otterbein Homes, said: “Extending the Otterbein brand to include home health services was critical to our continuing strategic goals, and we recognized an outstanding alignment with the level of care and the values displayed by Kimberly and Tim and the other partners at Pioneer.”

Otterbein Homes serves nearly 1,700 people and is related to the East Ohio and West Ohio Conferences of the United Methodist Church.

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The U.S. Federal Reserve is best equipped to supervise the largest, most complex firms, a top U.S. Treasury official said on Friday.

“No regulator had a perfect record leading up to the crisis,” Deputy Secretary Neal Wolin said in prepared remarks to the American Bar Association’s banking law committee. “But in our view, the Federal Reserve is the agency best equipped for the task of supervising the largest, most complex firms.”

The comments came three days after Senator Christopher Dodd, chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, proposed consolidating bank supervisory powers in a single agency, stripping the Fed of its role as a direct bank supervisor.

Wolin did not mention Dodd by name in his comments, but said the Fed’s supervisory role gave it a deep understanding of and timely access to information about the banking sector, payment systems and capital markets no credit check payday loan.

“Stripped of its supervisory role, the Fed would not have timely and complete information in a crisis,” he said.

The Fed, the U.S. central bank, has drawn sharp criticism from some lawmakers for its handling of the financial crisis, particularly its controversial decisions to extend emergency loans to firms such as AIG, which it did not directly supervise.

(Reporting by Emily Kaiser; Editing by Neil Stempleman)

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American International Group Inc’s tough talking chief executive has reportedly threatened to quit, but the giant insurer, which is showing signs of life after its brush with bankruptcy last year, could do fine without him.

Robert Benmosche threatened to quit AIG in part because he complains he cannot pay employees enough, according to the Wall Street Journal.

AIG declined comment, but in a letter to employees Benmosche said he was working aggressively to “overcome this compensation barrier that stands in the way of restoring AIG’s value.”

He also said he was “totally committed” to seeing the company through its difficulties.

As a recipient of some $180 billion in government aid, AIG falls under the purview of Obama administration compensation czar Kenneth Feinberg and Benmosche has balked at Feinberg’s proposed pay restrictions.

But if Benmosche, the well regarded former CEO of MetLife Inc makes good on his reported threats to leave AIG, it would hardly be a tragedy for the company, analysts said. He has been at the insurer for only about three months, which is not enough time for him to have become essential for its daily operations. And Wall Street is full of competent executives looking for work.

“The loss of one chief executive won’t change too much for AIG,” said Sean Egan, principal of ratings agency Egan-Jones Ratings Co in Haverford, Pennsylvania. “There are plenty of other people who can fill the role.”

A CALCULATED RISK

What is at issue in Benmosche’s conflicts with Feinberg is whether companies that rely on government support to stay in business can pay less than competitors that have shucked that support payday cash loans.

Feinberg has cut cash compensation for the 25 best-paid employees at companies that received multiple bailouts and is setting guidelines for pay for the next 75.

For AIG in particular, Feinberg has vowed to limit bonuses at the company’s Financial Products unit, whose massive payouts earlier this year sparked huge outrage. AIG is on track to pay $198 million in bonuses to Financial Products employees in March 2010.

Making these cuts amounts to a gamble.

“He’s thinking he can limit pay and that an insufficient number of people will leave for better opportunities to really harm the companies,” said Robert Sedgwick, a partner in executive compensation and benefits at law firm Morrison Cohen in New York.

To some analysts, that is a reasonable bet. The pool of talent for hire is likely fairly deep now, as financial companies have announced about 400,000 layoffs since the credit crunch really accelerated in mid-2007, according to outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. So even if people leave, others can replace them.

“There are a lot of qualified people out there who would love to work at AIG,” said Bill Fitzpatrick, equity research analyst at Optique Capital Management in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. 

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U.S. retailers are poised to defy gloom this week as earnings expectations have improved, but the big test will be what they say about holiday shopping.

Earnings estimates for Standard & Poor’s 500 retailers have headed higher in recent weeks, some after October same-store sales figures were released Thursday, leaving strategists optimistic about next week’s retail results.

The sector takes center stage just as the earnings calendar winds down, with results already in from almost 90 percent of S&P 500 companies.

Same-store sales were mixed. But several retailers expected to post results this week, including upscale department store chain Nordstrom JWS.N, performed better than expected on the same-store sales front.

That bodes well for the week’s results, analysts said, but commentary about store traffic, with the start of holiday shopping less than three weeks away, could be just as important to investors.

“It’s all about perception going into Christmas,” said Todd Leone, head of listed trading at Cowen & Co. in New York.

The S&P 500 is up 58 percent since its 12-year closing low in early March. But it’s down more than 2 percent since mid-October, and investors are anxious to see if the market can hold those gains through the end of the year.

The Friday after the Thanksgiving holiday marks the start of the holiday shopping period, when most retailers traditionally make most of their profits.

Third-quarter earnings for retail apparel S&P 500 companies are seen rising 18 percent, compared with expectations for a gain of just 4 percent just three weeks ago, said John Butters, director of U.S. earnings for Thomson Reuters, in New York.

SLIGHTLY BRIGHTER PROSPECTS

S&P 500 department store earnings are seen declining 48 percent, but that’s an improvement from expectations for a drop of 54 percent three weeks ago, he said.

Earnings for the entire consumer discretionary S&P sector, which includes most retailers, are expected to increase 44.7 percent from a year ago, compared with October 1 expectations for a gain of 16 percent, Thomson Reuters data showed.

“If comps (same-store sales) are any indication, there should be some positive surprises,” said Fred Dickson, market strategist at D.A. Davidson & Co. in Lake Oswego, Oregon.

Retailers have been helped by economic growth, even though employment levels are falling, analysts said.

Friday’s government jobs report put the nation’s unemployment rate at 10.2 percent, the highest in 26-1/2 years. 

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Japan’s demand for services rose for a third month in August, signaling that the country’s recovery from its deepest postwar recession is spreading to consumers.

The tertiary index, which captures 63 percent of the economy, advanced 0.3 percent from July, the Trade Ministry said today in Tokyo. The median forecast of 21 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News was for a 0.1 percent increase.

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The arrest of fugitive film director Roman Polanski by Swiss authorities on U.S. charges serves as a warning to bankers indicted for helping Americans evade U.S. taxes: be careful where you travel.

From the UBS AG() tax case, U.S. prosecutors so far have charged four foreigners with aiding Americans hide money overseas — including the former head of the Swiss banking firm’s wealth management section Raoul Weil — but none have been arrested because they are outside the U.S. reach.

These tax crimes are not covered under an extradition treaty between the United States and Switzerland, making it a safe haven as the Obama administration tries to crack down on the billions of dollars believed to be hidden overseas.

But many other countries are stricter on tax crimes and the four could face arrest if they left Switzerland.

“They’re basically prisoners in their own country,” said Peter Zeidenberg, a former federal prosecutor and now a partner at DLA Piper. “They’re going to be spending the rest of their lives scrutinizing the extradition treaties of every place they want to travel.”

Polanski was arrested in Switzerland after fleeing the United States in 1978 to avoid sentencing in an underage sex case. Despite not including most tax crimes, the U.S.-Swiss extradition pact could apply to Polanski but it might take years of legal battles to bring him to the United States.

“Be careful where you travel is one important message of the Polanski case,” said Alexander Greenawalt, an international law professor at Pace Law School in New York. But he noted that there is some discretion enforcing such arrest warrants.

“In theory you could travel to a country that might be dangerous for you,” he said. “If the authorities are not going through the right procedures or not pursuing the case, you might still be safe.”

BANKER INDICTED

In the tax case, prosecutors have also indicted Swiss banker Hansruedi Schumacher, who once worked for UBS but moved to Neue Zuercher Bank where he allegedly encouraged American clients to switch their accounts to his new employer because it would likely avoid U.S. scrutiny.

Schumacher was quickly fired by NZB after he was indicted in August. The bank also shut down its private banking business for U.S. customers earlier this year.

Also charged was Swiss lawyer Matthias Rickenbach who was accused of working with Schumacher to provide legal advice to his clients, allegedly advising them that because NZB did not have U.S. operations it would be less likely to receive pressure from the United States to reveal those accounts.

“The DOJ has shown time and again that it is going to be much more aggressive than it has been in the past going after these cases,” said Glen Donath, a former prosecutor now a partner at Sonnenschein Nath and Rosenthal LLP.

The U.S. Internal Revenue Service has given Americans until October 15 to come clean about any assets they hold overseas or face criminal prosecution. Already the IRS has granted one extension but has insisted it would be the only one.

Adding pressure for Americans to come forward is an August deal by the Swiss and U.S. governments to have UBS turn over 4,450 accounts of Americans to U.S. tax authorities. 

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The European Central Bank kept its interest rates at a record-low 1.0 percent on Thursday and its head Jean-Claude Trichet is expected to caution against hopes of a speedy economic recovery.

The decision met analyst expectations — all 82 economists in a Reuters poll had expected interest rates to stay on hold in October for the fifth month running, with most expecting them to stay unchanged until late next year.

“This was no surprise at all,” said Nomura economist Laurent Bilke. “The ECB has signaled there wouldn’t be any additional monetary policy stimulus but that they are not ready for a rate hike yet.”

Financial markets were largely unchanged after the decision.

The Governing Council’s Venice meeting was the second of two held annually outside its Frankfurt base and marks the first anniversary of coordinated rate cuts by major central banks in the aftermath of the Lehman Brothers collapse.

The Reserve Bank of Australia on Tuesday became the first Group of 20 central bank to raise rates after the recession hit.

While most analysts expect the next ECB rate move to be a hike, they forecast that it will not happen before the third quarter of next year. But tighter liquidity conditions may push up market rates before that, futures pricing shows.

The Bank of England also kept its rates on hold on Thursday, as was widely expected quick pay day loan.

Attention now turns to Trichet’s news conference, where he is seen confirming that current policy settings are appropriate. Markets will listen for any clues on the timing and order of the ECB’s exit strategy.

“Current rates are appropriate, that is a key sentence that will probably stay until well into next year,” Bank of America economist Holger Schmieding said.

The ECB is unlikely to detail its exit strategy, just to repeat that it can exit when needed, he added.

Trichet’s comments on how governments should wind back their extra spending and how the ECB will take fiscal exit into account in its monetary policy decisions will also be key.

“They will definitely not do any explicit coordination (between fiscal and monetary exit strategies),” Schmieding said, but added: “There might be actually be a case that if fiscal policy is tightened in 2011, the ECB may take that into account and thus have an indirect impact on its rate policy.”

DOLLAR WEAKNESS

Trichet’s comments on economic recovery will also face close scrutiny. The euro zone economy shrank by a revised 0.2 percent in the second quarter of the year, and analysts expect it to have grown 0.3 percent in the July-September quarter. 

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