Industry group names Armstrong Builder of the Decade

The Building Industry Association of Hawaii recently honored Robert “;Bob”; Armstrong as the Builder of the Decade for the 2000s at its annual installation dinner at the newly opened Construction Training Center of the Pacific in Waipahu.

Armstrong, president of Armstrong Builders Ltd. and the capital campaign chairman, helped BIA-Hawaii raise more than $7 million to build the Construction Training Center of the Pacific.

A two-story, 15,670-square-foot building in Waipahu encompasses the CTC. Seven classrooms, a training shop, a conference center for more than 100 attendees, administration offices, restrooms and separate employee and students lounges are in the facility.

Kona Brewing's organic beer gets certification

Kona Brewing Co.'s Oceanic Organic Saison is Hawaii's first certified organic beer.

The company recently received organic certification for the beer from the Hawaii Organic Farmers Association and brewed it last month. The beer will tap up at Kona Brewing Co.'s pubs in early January.

Kamakura Corp. earns top ranking from magazine

Honolulu-based Kamakura Corp., along with longtime distributor Fiserve, was ranked first worldwide for both asset and liability management software and liquidity risk management software in the RISK Magazine 2009 technology rankings.

Kamakura and Fiserve were also ranked in the top five in market risk, Basel II capital calculations, and in the “;risk dashboard”; category. Overall for all of the risk technology disciplines, the Kamakura-Fiserve team ranked seventh in the survey.

GEICO to celebrate its 60th anniversary

GEICO, the state's largest auto insurance company, will mark its 60th anniversary on Thursday.

The company, which wrote its first Hawaii auto policy on Dec. 31, 1949, opened its first branch office in Honolulu in 1980 with 10 associates. There are now 170 GEICO associates who service nearly 130,000 Hawaii households.

The insurer also provides coverage for homes, condominiums, boats, motorcycles and commercial vehicles.

Coming Up

» Today: Treasury auction

» Tomorrow: Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller releases its October index of home prices. The Conference Board releases the Consumer Confidence Index for December.

» Thursday: Labor Department releases weekly jobless claims. Freddie Mac, the mortgage company, releases weekly mortgage rates.

» Friday: New Year's Day. All markets closed.