Business Desk
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

ENERGY
WARMER WEATHER DRIVES DOWN GAS, OIL PRICES
Crude oil, heating oil and gasoline fell on warmer-than-normal weather that may cut consumption in the Northeast. The region’s home heating needs will be 39% below normal through November 7, said Weather Derivatives, a forecaster in Belton, Miss. The Northeast consumes 80% of the heating oil that goes to home furnaces in America. Inventories of distillate fuels, the category that includes heating oil and diesel, are 3.9% higher than a year ago.
– Bloomberg News
FINANCIAL SERVICES
MERRILL LYNCH ASSET MANAGEMENT EARNINGS RISE
Merrill Lynch & Company, the world’s largest brokerage firm, is earning the most money managing assets for individual investors since the stock market’s record high five years ago. Merrill’s private-client unit is having its best second half since the end of 2000 and earned three times as much in third-quarter fees as the firm’s corporate merger and stock and bond underwriting businesses.
“It’s a 180-degree shift from 2 1/2 years ago, when it was panic city and people wanted to move everything to cash,” said Rod Cantrell, 43, a financial adviser in Washington, North Carolina, with St. Louis-based brokerage Edward D. Jones & Co. “But it’s not like six years ago, when it was easy.”
– Bloomberg News
ACCOUNTING
JUDGE GIVES PRELIMINARY APPROVAL OF SETTLEMENT IN KPMG CASE
NEWARK, N.J. – A federal judge in Newark granted preliminary approval to a proposed $225 million class-action settlement by Big Four accounting firm KPMG and the Sidley Austin Brown & Wood law firm over questionable tax shelters that KPMG sold to wealthy individuals. Under the accord, KPMG would pay about 80% of the settlement, while Sidley Austin would pay 20%.The settlement was reached with the class-action law firm Milberg Weiss Bershad & Schulman which stands to earn up to $30 million in fees.
In granting preliminary approval, U.S. District Judge Dennis M. Cavanaugh rejected arguments by competing class-action law firms that Milberg Weiss and the defendants engaged in collusive settlement talks and that Milberg should be disqualified because of alleged conflicts of interest. Milberg and the defendants had denied the allegations.
– Associated Press
TELECOMMUNICATIONS
FCC APPROVES TWO MERGERS
WASHINGTON – The Federal Communications Commission unanimously approved yesterday the mergers of Verizon Communications with MCI and SBC Communications with AT&T, deciding that the acquisition by two regional Bell companies of two of their largest competitors in the enterprise services market are in the public interest. The agency required Verizon and SBC, as a condition of regulatory approval, to offer DSL service on a standalone basis without requiring customers to purchase local phone service, which is known in policy circles as “naked DSL,” for two years, though it didn’t include any pricing requirements. It also extended pricing caps for high-volume lines known as special access and required Verizon and SBC to freeze certain unbundled network rates for 30 months. Verizon and SBC also had to agree to Net neutrality principles that ensure unfettered consumer access to the Internet for two years and to maintain Internet peering arrangements with as many Internet backbone providers after the mergers as they had before the mergers.
– Dow Jones Newswires
PHARMACEUTICALS
TYLENOL TURNS 50
TRENTON, N.J. – Tylenol, originally a pain reliever for children, has hit middle age. The world’s best-known acetaminophen brand turns 50 today, and it’s more popular than ever, in part because of its reputation as the safest nonprescription pain reliever. Even a fatal 1982 poisoning scare barely hurt the brand – and introduced tamperproof packaging.
Already in medicine cabinets in 70% of American households, Tylenol now is seeing sales jump amid concern over the risks of other painkillers. Sales have grown by double digits since last fall, according to Tylenol maker McNeil Consumer & Specialty Pharmaceuticals.
– Associated Press
IN BRIEF
Prosecutors now have until November 10 to seek an indictment against Phillip Bennett, the president and chief executive of Refco, in his securities fraud case, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney’s office in Manhattan said yesterday … Microsoft lost a U.S. Supreme Court bid to slash $360 million from the potential award in a lawsuit that says the company’s Internet Explorer browser relies on technology patented by the University of California.
– Dow Jones Newswires and Bloomberg News