UPI NewsTrack Business

Lower jobless claims boost Wall Street

NEW YORK, Dec. 18 (UPI) -- Wall Street ended Thursday on a high note with the Dow Jones industrials ending up 102.82 points boosted by better than expected drop in jobless claims.

The Dow Jones industrial average closed at 10,248.08, a 1.01 percent increase, while the Nasdaq composite index ended up 34.85, or 1.81 percent at 1,956.18. The Standard & Poor's 500 ended up 12.70, or 1.18 percent, at 1,089.18. New York Stock Exchange volume was 1.56 billion.

The Labor Department reported that the number of U.S. workers filing first-time applications for unemployment benefits fell last week. Initial jobless claims declined a sharper-than-expected 22,000 to 353,000 in the week ending Dec. 13.

The picture was also helped by analyst upgrades of Dow components American Express, Honeywell and Wal-Mart.

Overseas, Tokyo's Nikkei 225 stock average ended up 11.36 points, or 0.1 percent, at 10,104.00 following a 178.96-point fall Wednesday, and London's FTSE-100 share Index was up 28.7, or 0.7 percent, at 4,382.9.

The euro was trading around $1.2412 Thursday, up from $1.2405 late Wednesday in New York, while the dollar was higher at 107.67 to the yen, from 107.41 late Wednesday in New York.

Thain named to head NYSE

NEW YORK, Dec. 18 (UPI) -- John A. Thain, president and chief executive officer of the investment bank Goldman Sachs, was named head of the New York Stock Exchange Thursday.

Thain, who was considered a possible successor to Goldman Sachs chief executive Henry M. Paulson Jr., is viewed as a strong advocate of a move toward more electronic trading at the NYSE, the Washington Post said. He was seen as a long-shot candidate for the NYSE job by traders because he has criticized the exchange's floor-based system.

Thain succeeds Dick Grasso, who was chairman and chief executive until being forced to resign in September when revelations of his $187.5 million pay package outraged investors and shareholder groups.

Like interim NYSE chairman and chief executive John S. Reed, who made the announcement, Thain is a graduate of MIT. Reed is an avid technologist, having revolutionized back-office operations at Citicorp while serving as chief executive.

Thain's appointment comes after the exchange agreed to split the roles of chairman and chief executive.

Microsoft, New York file anti-spam suits

NEW YORK, Dec. 18 (UPI) -- Software giant Microsoft and the state of New York Thursday filed six lawsuits in the war against spam, CNET News.com reported.

Synergy6, an e-mail marketing company based in New York, and Scott Richter, a well-known spammer and president of OptInRealBig.com, are among the defendants named in the suits.

The suits allege Richter and accomplices across the nation engaged in a spam campaign that employed such techniques as forged sender names, false subject lines, fake server names, inaccurate and misrepresented sender addresses or obscured transmission paths.

Microsoft filed five other lawsuits against spammers who allegedly used the same transmission path in New York that originally led investigators to Richter and the spam network.

The announcement of the lawsuits comes a week after Virginia's attorney general issued the first felony indictment under that state's anti-spam law and just days after President Bush signed an anti-spam law.

In June, Microsoft filed 15 lawsuits in the United States and Britain against spammers, claiming they were responsible for flooding its MSN Internet service with more than 2 billion unsolicited e-mail messages.

Ruling: Drugmakers delayed generic launch

WASHINGTON, Dec. 18 (UPI) -- The U.S. Federal Trade Commission ruled Thursday three drug manufacturers illegally delayed the release of a generic drug.

The FTC found Schering-Plough Corp., Upsher-Smith Laboratories Inc. and American Home Products entered into illegal agreements in 1997 and 1998 to delay the entry of lower-cost generic competition for Schering's prescription drug K-Dur 20, used to treat people with low potassium.

According to the Commission's opinion, Schering and its potential generic competitors, Upsher and AHP, had settled patent litigation with terms that included unconditional payments by Schering in return for agreements to defer introduction of the generic products.

In a unanimous opinion, signed by Commissioner Thomas Leary, the FTC found these provisions amounted to unfair competition and entered an order barring similar conduct in the future.

The commission's news release did not specify what, if any penalties are associated with the ruling.