US glass manufacturer Corning has announced that it is expecting lower earnings due to falling demand of LCD screens which till now has been the prime mover of the company’s profits.

After Corning made the announcement on Wednesday, investor confidence was badly shattered and the impact was felt on its stocks. Share prices in New York fell by 7.8% or $1.56 to close at $17.94.

New York-based Corning is a major manufacturer of the display glass that is used in liquid crystal display screens of televisions and computers. Among other products made by the company are ceramic substrates, filter for cars, glass and plastic components for pharmaceutical purposes as well as optical fiber for telecommunication companies.

In recent years, Corning has been delivering impressive sales figures powered by the fast growing market for LCD TVs in the US. However slower purchase orders by some Asian panel makers have led to a decline in global demand. Earlier in the year, Corning expected the global market for LCD glass to expand by 20% to 30% and accordingly predicted adjusted profits of 48 cents to 51 cents per share on sales of 1.7 billion. However now the company now seems resigned to revise those figures to between 43 cents an 45 cents.

Even though Hurricane Gustav passed over New Orleans without causing much damage, the city suffered a slide in confidence as companies began to reconsider their decision to invest in the flood-prone city.

The non-partisan Political and Economic Research Council recently reported that around two out of three small business owners reported losses due to 2005 Hurricane Katrina. Even after 2 years, more than one in four small business owners continued to earn less than half of pre-Katrina revenues. Inadequate labor was another problem plaguing businesses in the area.

However, there have been attempts made to lure back companies into New Orleans. One such project in the wings is a business disruption insurance policy being offered by Greater New Orleans Inc. City officials also realize the need to restore the coastal wetlands which would weaken the impact of future hurricanes and would also keep the Port of Louisiana competitive.

In recent times there have been some hopeful signs of a revival in New Orleans economy. The tourism sector has been doing good business and figures are up to pre-Katrina levels. Lately several technology companies as well as creative professional firms have set up base in New Orleans, attracted by low labor costs and banking on intellectual capital.

In the absence of any new source of backing, the New York Sun might be forced to wrap up publication by the end of this month, said its editor on Wednesday.

The New York Sun is a five-day-a-week newspaper that has limited circulation but professes to present an alternative perspective to that of New York Times. The editor of New York Sun, Seth Lipsky posted the announcement in the online edition of the newspaper on Wednesday, saying that the newspaper has been incurring substantial losses and is yet to make a profit.

The announcement which appears in the print edition on Thursday goes on to blame rising costs as well as tightening advertising markets for the financial woes of the newspaper. Even though investors are ready to pump in more capital into the publication, keeping it operational will require other sources of funding. Some alternatives being explored are negotiations with other newspaper owners and outside financiers who would be willing to try out “possible combinations or investor relationships”, according to Lipsky.

The editor further said that despite increase in print advertising revenues for two successive years and so far this year, it has not been possible to recover the losses. The New York Sun came into existence in October 2001 and began daily publications from April 2002.

Albert J. Stanley, former head of KBR, has pleaded guilty to charges of bribing Nigerian officials in order to secure business contracts in the African country.

On Wednesday, Mr. Stanley entered into a plea agreement with the United States District Court, Houston. Under the agreement, he admitted before the court that he had conspired to offer $182 million in bribes to officials in return for a $6 billion contract to set up a liquefied natural gas complex in Nigeria.

Mr. Stanley admitted that he had authorized the hiring of two consulting companies to process talks with Nigerian officials. Of these, he had paid $132 million to one consulting company and more than $50 million to the other. Other than this, he also pleaded guilty to receiving kickbacks worth $10.8 million from the consulting companies. Under the plea agreement, Mr. Stanley could be jailed for seven years and forced to pay $10.8 million in restitution.

Till December 2003, Albert J. Stanley headed KBR, one of the biggest engineering and construction subsidiaries of Halliburton. However the parent company dismissed him in 2004 once his involvement in the kickback scheme surface and he was found to have enriched himself by as much as $5 million. Last year, KBR was spun off from Halliburton.

First Horizon National Corp has warned investors that its losses from bad debt were likely to be much higher than previously expected.

The announcement on Wednesday initially led to a fall in share prices of First Horizon National Corp which dropped as low as $10.51. However later in the session, its stocks rallied and finally closed at $11.74 which was an overall rise of 5 cents. Over the last year, the bank’s stocks have traded between $4.52 and $31.29.

First Horizon National Corp is a regional bank based in Memphis, Tennessee. Last Tuesday, bank officials revealed that continuing adverse market conditions meant that it net charge-offs for the year would rise to $485 million which was an additional burden of $100 million from its previous estimate of $385 million. Various factors like the state of the housing market, the potential resolution of bad loans as well as overall economic conditions would eventually determine the quantum of final losses.

First Horizon has already sold off around 250 of its mortgage production offices outside the state as well as its loan origination and servicing platforms to MetLife Bank. This deal covered assets worth $380 million and would add another $35 million to $50 million in charges to the company’s losses.

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