| Starbucks to close some stores, stop selling breakfast sandwiches
Starbucks will say goodbye to its breakfast sandwiches, close about 100 underperforming U.S. locations and slow down the number of domestic openings as the once-go-go coffee company retools itself amid a slowing economy. The changes, announced Wednesday along with modest first-quarter earnings, also include putting more emphasis on overseas expansion. Few stores will be closed in the Pacific Northwest, and employees at the shuttered stores will be transferred to other sites, said Chairman Howard Schultz, who took over as chief executive Jan. 7. "It's important to understand a new day is here," Schultz said in an interview with the Seattle P-I after the earnings release. "We want to put the customer at the forefront of every decision we make, and we want to exceed their expectations at what we are doing." Schultz, who replaced fired CEO Jim Donald, said a five-point plan on a "catalyst for change" would be revealed at the company's annual meeting March 19.
Undersea cable network breaks down
A breakdown in an international undersea cable network disrupted Internet links to Egypt, India and Gulf Arab countries on Wednesday, and Egypt said it could take several days for its services to return to normal. It was not immediately possible to gauge the impact of the disruption on financial institutions. Egypt's telecoms ministry said 70 per cent of the country's Internet network was down and India initially said it had lost over half its bandwidth. "This cut has affected Internet services in Egypt with a partial disruption of 70 per cent of the network nationwide," the Egyptian ministry said in a statement. Residents of Gulf Arab countries also reported a slowdown in Internet connectivity. The Bahrain Telecommunications Co said its services were affected after two undersea cables were cut near Alexandria, on Egypt's north coast.
Dollar rises above US88c
THE Australian dollar was stronger at noon, rising above $US0.8800 as a third consecutive day of recovery on the local share market restored confidence in high interest rate currencies. At 12noon (AEDT), the Australian dollar was trading at $US0.8825/28, up from yesterday's close of $US0.8738/42. During the morning, the domestic currency traded between a low of $US0.8808 and a high of $US0.8832. The Australian share market gained 3 per cent during the morning session, encouraging carry traders to sell the low-yielding Japanese yen for high interest rate units like the domestic currency. The local unit is now trading above 94 yen for the first time in four days. RBC Capital Markets senior currency strategist Sue Trinh said the equity market rally was a more favourable driver of the Australian dollar than expectations that official interest rates will climb again next month.
Who's Blogging
A handful of guards taking a 15-minute nap on company time does not fairly reflect the industry's level of safety. For a news story, it's pretty thin gruel. Yet that's what leading media are feeding the public. Repeatedly. Jack Spencer is Research Fellow in Nuclear Energy at The Heritage Foundation (heritage.org). .
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