UPI NewsTrack Business

Markets mixed before corporate reports

NEW YORK, N.M., April 11 (UPI) -- U.S markets were mixed Monday as concerns related to a potential government shutdown shifted to tensions concerning first-quarter earnings.

News a federal government shutdown was averted late Friday meant the mood on markets Monday would likely be dominated by a wait-and-see attitude, as well as corporate reports on first-quarter performances, set to begin after markets close with a report from Alcoa.

In early afternoon trading, the Dow Jones industrial average added 9.88 points or 0.08 percent to 13,389.90. The Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 2.20 or 0.17 percent to 1,325.97. The Nasdaq composite index was down 9.75, or 0.35 percent to 2,770.08.

The 10-year treasury note rose 2/32 to yield 3.58 percent.

The euro fell to $1.444 from Friday's $1.4457. Against the yen, the dollar fell to 84.724 yen from Friday's 84.85 yen.

In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 index lost 0.5 percent, 48.38, to 9,719.70.

Auto engineers find times have changed

DETROIT, April 11 (UPI) -- An annual conference for automotive industry engineers illustrates a robust turnaround for U.S. automakers, observers said.

After a prolonged slump followed by a painful recession marked by bankruptcy filings by General Motors Co. and Chrysler LLC, suddenly the Society for Automotive Engineers World Congress 2011, which opens in Detroit Tuesday, expects a large jump in exhibitors and technical papers, The Detroit News reported Monday.

In addition, the conference will feature a much larger job fair.

Last year's event included 17 companies participating in a jobs fair. This year, 35 companies have signed up, the newspaper said.

Suddenly, "the industry needs more talented people to build the next generation of vehicles," said David Cole, chairman emeritus of the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, Mich.

"This is a serious issue, and we need to find more talented people and convince more young people to go into auto engineering," he said.

The event will include 147 exhibitors, 44 more than a year ago, and feature presentation of 1,255 technical papers, compared to 1,101 presented in 2010.

This year's theme is also a sign of things to come. The conference is called "Charging Forward Together," as a reference to electric power for vehicles.

"Advanced propulsion is a big focus of this year's event," said Patti Kreh, the engineering society's business unit leader for conferences.

Lots of e-mail clutter ups phishing risk

BUFFALO, N.Y., April 11 (UPI) -- People who send and receive lots of e-mail, have online relationships and shop online are at risk of falling victim to phishing, U.S. researchers say.

Arun Vishwanath and H. Raghav Rao, both of the University at Buffalo, and colleagues say their study, "Why Do People Get Phished?" published in the journal Decision Support Systems and Electronic Commerce, is timely in light of the online marketing firm Epsilon having its database breached by hackers recently.

Phishing is the term used for the tactic of using the names of credible businesses such as American Express, government institutions such as the Internal Revenue Service or well-known events such as Beijing Olympics to get people to divulge their usernames, passwords and credit card details.

The senders of these malicious e-mails use statements invoking fear, threat, excitement or urgency to persuade people to respond with personal and sensitive information, the study says.

"Individuals need to be extra careful when utilizing a single e-mail account to respond to all their e-mails," the researchers say in a statement. "An effective strategy is to use different e-mail accounts for different purposes. If one e-mail address is used solely for banking and another is used solely for personal communication with family and friends, it will increase your attention to the details of the e-mail and reduce the likelihood of chance-deception because of clutter."

Porsche tops Forbes' quality list

NEW YORK, April 11 (UPI) -- U.S. consumers believe luxury and quality go hand-in-hand and rate Porsche as the highest-quality automobile, Forbes magazine reported Monday.

Forbes averaged out scores of two J.D. Power's surveys -- one that rated consumer satisfaction on 2010 model cars after 90 days of ownership and one that rates the same after three years of ownership. They also factored in scores on quality from a survey done by automobile industry research firm ALG.

Porsche topped the list with an average score of 590.2, followed by Lexus with an average score of 585.3. BMW, Jaguar and Mercedes came in third, fourth and fifth, respectively.

"The perception of the quality of the mainstream is certainly a cut below the luxury brands," Eric Lyman, the director of residual values for the automotive analysis firm ALG, told Forbes.

"People expect that a luxury good has higher quality -- that's why it's considered a luxury good," Lyman said.

The top eight also included, in order of preference, Acura, Audi and Volkswagen.