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HAWAII

United Way honors companies

First Hawaiian Bank, Certified Management Inc. and UH Federal Credit Union were among the companies lauded by Aloha United Way for helping to meet its fund-raising goal of $13.2 million last year.

Aloha United Way also awarded Anson Pang, collections and recovery manager at American Savings Bank, as coordinator of the year. AUW's "Spirit of Community Award" winners will be honored during an annual meeting in April.

MAINLAND

Banks lose bid to toss IPO suits

NEW YORK >> Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Credit Suisse First Boston Inc., and other rival investment banks must defend against legal claims that they and hundreds of Internet start-ups rigged initial public offerings.

Investors say the banks and start-ups they took public manipulated the IPO market during the technology stock boom of the late 1990s. A federal judge rejected the banks' request to dismiss the suits. Lawyers for the investors say damages might top $1 billion, or about half of Goldman's profit in 2002.

EUROPE

Lufthansa to cut fleet, freeze jobs

FRANKFURT >> Deutsche Lufthansa AG, Europe's third-biggest airline, said it will reduce the number of planes flown in Europe and freeze hiring in a bid to lower costs and boost cash flow.

The airline and affiliates will cut 46 planes in the coming weeks, the carrier said in a statement to the Frankfurt exchange. Lufthansa will also reduce investment by 200 million euros ($215 million) and implement a hiring freeze.

Lufthansa cited the threat of war and a stagnating worldwide economy in forecasting that earnings before interest and taxes this year will at best match 2002's operating profit of 700 million to 750 million euros.

Hacker gains access to 8 million accounts

NEW YORK >> An "unauthorized intruder" gained access to some 8 million credit card account numbers -- including Visa, MasterCard and American Express -- by breaching the security of a company that processes transactions for merchants, the card companies said yesterday.

Visa said that there had been no sign of fraudulent activity involving the accounts and that the card association was monitoring the situation.

Christine Elliott, a spokeswoman for American Express, said that security processes were in place to determine if card numbers were being misused but that "we're not aware of any unusual activity with the affected cards."

JAPAN

Economy continues to weaken

TOKYO >> Japan's economy continues to weaken amid feeble consumer spending and record-high unemployment, the government said today in a monthly report that kept its assessment unchanged from the previous month.

The Cabinet Office's report for February said worries remain about a slowdown in the world economy. Exports, which drove growth last year, have stopped their climb and industrial production is dropping.

Japan's economy has been stuck in the doldrums for more than a decade as its manufacturing sector gets battered by increasingly competitive Asian economies with cheaper labor.

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