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Business Briefs

Reported by Star-Bulletin staff & wire

Thursday, May 25, 2000

Back on the
job market

By Dennis Oda, Star-Bulletin
Seresa Fonoti uses the back of her boyfriend, Duane
Toelupe, to fill in her application at the Costco table
at yesterday's WorkForce 2000 Job Fair & Career
Expo in the Neal Blaisdell Center. The expo attracted
about 9,000 job seekers and included about 100
companies. It was sponsored by Altres Staffing,
Careergiant.com, the state, Hawaii Business College,
Hawaii Medical Services Association, the Hawaii
Newspaper Agency and The JobLine.

Adjustable rates hit 9-year high

MCLEAN, Va. -- The average interest rate on a one-year adjustable rate mortgage rose this week to the highest level in more than nine years, Freddie Mac said. The 30-year home mortgage rate fell.

The average rate on a one-year adjustable mortgage rose to 7.25 percent from 7.15 percent last week and is the highest since 7.36 percent in April 1991. The 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage fell to 8.62 percent this week from 8.64 percent. The average 15-year rate was unchanged at 8.31 percent.

California Pizza to issue stock

WASHINGTON -- California Pizza Kitchen Inc. has filed for an initial public offering estimated to raise $70 million for debt repayment and other uses. The Los Angeles-based chain is known for "innovative premium pizzas" with menu items such as Thai Chicken Pizza and Philly Cheesesteak Pizza, though its 100 restaurants offer a full menu with salads and pastas. The average diner's check comes to $10.50, the company said in filing for the IPO with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The company has three Oahu restaurants.

In other news . . .

ISLANDIA, N.Y. -- Computer Associates International Inc., a maker of antivirus software, warned of a new e-mail virus called Cybernet, which can affect Microsoft Corp.'s Outlook program and disable computers. The virus, much like the "I Love You" virus, also spreads through Microsoft's software, Computer Associates said. Cybernet appears as an e-mail with a subject line "You've Got Mail!!!" and says it's virus free, but it will try to format a computer user's hard drive and infect Microsoft Word or Excel files.