Reported by Star-Bulletin staff & wire
Thursday, June 12, 1997
WASHINGTON -- Average interest rates on 30-year, fixed-rate mortgages fell this week to the lowest level since February. The average decreased to 7.72 percent from 7.85 percent a week earlier, the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp. said today. Thirty-year mortgages
fall to 7.72 percentIt was the lowest rate since the week ended Feb. 27, four weeks before the Federal Reserve tightened monetary policy. After the tightening, the rate rose to a seven-month high of 8.18 percent for the week ended April 3 and has declined in seven of the 10 weeks since.
Fifteen-year mortgages, a popular option for those refinancing mortgages, averaged 7.27 percent this week, also the lowest since the week ended Feb. 27 and down from 7.40 percent a week earlier.
On one-year adjustable rate mortgages, lenders were asking an average initial rate of 5.67 percent this week, a 13-week low and down from 5.78 percent.
The rates do not include add-on fees known as points.
NEW YORK -- Coca-Cola Enterprises Inc. may seek to increase prices after July 4, potentially ending the price war in the soft-drink industry, the Wall Street Journal reported today. Coca-Cola seen
ready to raise soda pricesThe price move was outlined in a memo distributed recently by Coca-Cola Co.'s biggest bottler to company executives.
The memo may be in response to PepsiCo Inc. comments to analysts last week that "irrational" pricing in the industry could temporarily squeeze U.S. profits, taking particular aim at Coca-Cola's role in the pricing war, the Journal reported.
NEW YORK -- Polo Ralph Lauren Corp.'s stock set a galloping pace in the first day of trading amid strong demand for the $767 million initial public offering of the designer of clothes, housewares and fragrances. Ralph Lauren's stock
wears well on Wall St.The stock rose $5.50 to close at $31.50 in trading of nearly 20 mil
lion shares, making it the most-active stock on New York Stock market. Earlier the shares rose as much as 25 percent to $33, Bloomberg News reported.
The stock sale, the second-largest IPO this year, is soaring on its history of strong earnings from lucrative licensing agreements and savvy marketing of its goods, investors said. The company simply outclasses other fashion IPOs, including Donna Karan International Inc. and Mossimo Inc., analysts said. "Donna Karan couldn't shine Ralph Lauren's shoes," said President David Menlow of the IPO Financial Network.
New York-based Polo Ralph Lauren priced the 29.5 million share offering at $26 each, more than the expected price range of $22 to $25.
The offering, which represents a 30 percent stake, values the company at $2.56 billion.
PORTLAND, Ore. -- PacifiCorp reached agreed to buy Energy Group Plc for $9.8 billion in cash and assumed debt and lease obligations, vaulting it into the ranks of the largest U.S. utilities. PacifiCorp to acquire
London conglomerateCiting sources familiar with the agreement, the New York Times and the Oregonian reported that PacifiCorp, a Portland, Ore.-based utility and telecommunications holding company, will sell its telecommunications unit, Pacific Telecom, for about $1.5 billion to help finance the Energy Group deal.
PacifiCorp would pay $6 billion in cash for London-based Energy Group and assume $3.8 billion of debt and lease obligations, the sources said. Energy Group, which was spun off last year by Hanson Plc, the U.K. conglomerate, owns a large U.K. electric utility and the biggest U.S. coal company. Boards of both companies have voted on the preliminary terms of the deal, which has not been finalized, a source said.