The way it's going for Nortel, maybe it's time to turn out the lights

FABRICE TAYLOR 

Analysts are starting to say so and even Nortel's accountants admit it: The company is worthless. Why does it still have any market value left?RBC Dominion Securities Inc.'s analyst cut Nortel's price target to zero last week. He called his report ''The last one,'' which kind of sums it up. That downgrade came on the heels of another bloodletting quarter: Nortel lost another $3.4-billion (U.S.) in the third quarter and is down $3.7-billion for the year so far.

Behold the magic moving average: It's not perfect, but it's close

JOHN HEINZL 

Wouldn't it be nice if there was a nearly foolproof way to know when the stock market has bottomed? A signal that, with almost 100 per cent accuracy, could tell us when the carnage was over and a new bull market had begun?

Recreational vehicle sector littered with roadkill

BENJ GALLANDER AND BEN STADELMANN 

The lure of the open road. Adventure around the next bend. The independence of a full tank of fuel and nobody telling you where to go. That ethos might sound like a born-to-be-wild biker, but it is also the tune of the more prosaic millions who satisfy their wanderlust by enjoying life on the road in a recreational vehicle.

COMPUTER-WISE, THROUGH THE YEARS

76%Portion of small business owners, regardless of age, who say they are very concerned about computer security and privacy.55%Portion of owners under age of 30 who say laptops are critical to their business (compared with 43 per cent of those over the age of 55).

The PC who cried wolf

GRANT BUCKLER 

A message appears on your PC, warning that a virus has been detected. It asks you to ''click here for more information,'' then takes you to a website where you can download - for a fee - software to fix the problem. Thankful, you do so.

Heard the one about the talking BlackBerry?

MATT HARTLEY 

Tony Cassetta was speaking to an audience of die-hard corporate BlackBerry users at a conference earlier this year when he asked a taboo question: How many of you talk, text or e-mail with your BlackBerry while driving?

Life magazine images find new life on Google

Matt Hartley 

Millions of never-before-seen photos from the dusty archives of Life magazine will soon be unearthed and immortalized online, thanks to a new initiative from Google Inc. Yesterday, the search engine kingpin announced that the Life magazine photo archive will now be available through Google's Image Search feature. The collection is estimated to consist of more than 10 million photos, many of which were never published in the magazine and only exist as negatives, slides and etchings.

Burberry shares fall on second-half outlook

British luxury goods company Burberry Group PLC reported a 13-per-cent rise in first-half profit yesterday, but its shares dropped as it said second-half business was proving more difficult, particularly in the United States. Burberry posted a profit of & 74.8-million ($137.9-million) for the six months to Sept. 30, 2008, up from & 66.1-million a year ago. Chief executive officer Angela Ahrendts said the fundamentals of the company ''remain strong, despite the current very challenging environment.'' But the group added that the U.S. has ''become a more challenging market'' in the second half of the year. BRBY (London) fell 25 pence to & 1.75.

Carrefour replaces CEO in restructuring

Carrefour SA said yesterday it will replace its chief executive officer with a former top manager at Switzerland's Nestle SA, the result of long-simmering tensions over the French retail giant's performance and strategy. Carrefour's board named Swede Lars Olofsson to replace outgoing CEO Jose Luis Duran, effective Jan. 1. Speculation over Mr. Duran's future at Carrefour, the world's second largest retailer after Wal-Mart Stores Inc., has mounted since last year when the company's long-standing top shareholder ceded its position to a consortium controlled by French billionaire Bernard Arnault and U.S. private equity firm Colony Capital. In July, shareholders had voted to change the company's management structure, creating a board that excludes Mr. Duran. CA (Paris) rose €1.05 to €30.87 ($47.94).

EasyJet board dispute escalates as profit falls

A row on the board of budget airline easyJet PLC escalated yesterday when founder and non-executive director Stelios Haji-Iannou refused to approve the carrier's annual accounts as it posted a 45-per-cent drop in full-year earnings. The London-based airline reported a profit of & 83.2-million ($153.06-million) in the year to Sept. 30, compared with & 152.3-million a year ago, as higher fuel costs ate into stronger ticket sales. Revenue rose 31.5 per cent to & 2.36-billion, boosted by the acquisition of GB Airways in January and a 17-per-cent gain in passenger numbers to 43.7 million. The result was overshadowed by an accompanying statement from Mr. Haji-Iannou, in which he argued that the board was overvaluing newly acquired assets, including GB Airways. EZJ (London) fell 26 pence to & 2.51.

Belgian court rejects appeal of Fortis sale

A Belgian commercial court has thrown out a shareholder challenge to the fire sale of troubled bank Fortis to France's BNP Paribas SA. The Brussels-based court rejected an appeal by shareholder activist group Deminor and holders represented by lawyer Mischael Modrikamen to suspend the sale of Fortis's Belgian units to BNP Paribas. But it ordered experts to examine whether the price paid by BNP Paribas was adequate - €14.5-billion ($22.5-billion) for a 75-per-cent stake of Fortis's Belgian banking operations and all of Fortis Insurance Belgium. Shareholders said they should have been consulted when Fortis agreed to the buyout Oct. 5. BNP (Paris) fell €2.20 to €40.82.

France hosting follow-up to G20 economic summit

France will host a January meeting of world leaders and experts to look for ways out of the global financial crisis, President Nicolas Sarkozy's office said yesterday. Mr. Sarkozy and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown returned from a Washington summit over the weekend with less ambitious commitments than they had sought for changes to the world financial system. The Jan. 8-9 meeting in Paris will be co-hosted by Mr. Sarkozy and Mr. Brown's predecessor, Tony Blair. French officials said it was too soon to confirm which world leaders will attend, but that Nobel economists Joseph Stiglitz and India's Amartya Sen will be present. Mr. Sarkozy's office said the meeting is to be complementary to the Washington summit, but a less formal forum.

Home Depot posts profit but sees sales slowing

Saks slashes prices, posts big loss

Wholesale prices in U.S. drop by most in 22 years

Wholesale prices in the United States plunged a record amount in October as energy prices fell by the largest amount in 22 years. The U.S. Labour Department reported yesterday that wholesale prices dropped by 2.8 per cent in October, the biggest one-month decline on records that go back more than 60 years. The previous record holder was a 1.6-per-cent fall in October, 2001, the month after the terrorist attacks. The overall decline in the department's Producer Price Index was bigger than the 1.8-per-cent drop analysts had expected. However, core inflation, which excludes energy and food, rose by a bigger-than-expected 0.4 per cent. The rise in core inflation didn't alter the view that plunging energy prices and a slowing economy would slash inflation pressures.

HP posts strong results, gives positive outlook

Hewlett-Packard Co. posted stronger-than-expected results and forecast full-year profit above Wall Street estimates, underscoring its resilience to an economic crisis that has dragged down other tech companies. Shares of HP jumped 15 per cent as its preliminary October quarter results suggested the world's largest-maker of personal computers was winning market share and benefiting from recurring revenue streams from services and printing supplies. HP's preliminary profit in the fiscal fourth quarter that ended Oct. 31 was 84 cents (U.S.) a share, or $1.03 excluding items. Analysts expected per-share earnings of $1, excluding items, according to Reuters Estimates. Fourth-quarter revenue rose 19 per cent to $33.6-billion. The company forecast fiscal 2009 earnings of $3.88 to $4.03 a share. HPQ (Nasdaq) jumped $4.25 to $33.59.

Chrysler and German firm team up on axle plant

Chrysler LLC and German auto parts supplier ZF Friedrichschafen AG have struck a deal for ZF to run a new Chrysler axle factory north of Detroit. The German company will own the equipment at the new factory, while Chrysler will own the building and employ its 350 workers. Financial terms were not disclosed. Chrysler vice-chairman and president Tom LaSorda said yesterday that ZF's purchase of the equipment will help the auto maker's short-term cash flow and give Chrysler access to new fuel-efficient axle technology from ZF. The factory is an example of how Chrysler will take on partners and do business in the future, Mr. LaSorda said. The factory in Marysville, Mich., nearly 100 kilometres north of Detroit, will build three axles for Chrysler vehicles starting in 2010.

CALLING CANADA

GORDON PITTS 

When John McArthur wrapped up 15 years as dean of Harvard Business School in 1995, he had unfinished business: There were too few Canadians getting Harvard MBAs.About 35 Canadians usually show up each year among the 900 entrants to the elite business school - but it was more than a matter of numbers. While HBS had cracked the Toronto corporate market, the cost of a Harvard MBA - estimated at more than $155,000 (U.S.) - discouraged bright young people from smaller centres. ''I felt if we could get rid of the sticker shock problem, we'd have a better chance of recruiting a young engineer from Regina who says to his boss at the potash works, ''I'm thinking of going to Harvard,' '' says Mr. McArthur, 74, who originally hails from Burnaby, B.C.

Ecuador to limit outflows, imports

ALONSO SOTO AND ALEXANDRA VALENCIA 

Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa said yesterday he will jump-start his country's economy and limit the OPEC nation's capital outflows and imports to counter a spreading global crisis that has dragged down oil prices.

Foreclosures mounting, lawmakers back bailout

ALAN ZIBEL AND MARCY GORDON 

Top lawmakers threw their support yesterday behind a proposal to use $24-billion (U.S.) in government funds to help struggling borrowers, as reports showed U.S. home prices sinking in four out of five cities and home builders reported their worst-ever business outlook.

APEC pushing to keep markets open to foreign trade

Asia-Pacific leaders will issue a call this weekend to keep markets open to foreign trade, despite the crisis rattling the global economy, an official drafting the statement said yesterday.

Flaherty poised to oversee deficit

STEVEN CHASE AND KEVIN CARMICHAEL 

Jim Flaherty may be set to become the first federal finance minister in nearly 40 years to oversee a return to budget deficits, but economists say they're generally satisfied with his occasionally controversial stewardship.

Bay Street hears growling at the gate

SANDRA RUBIN 

In a decision one litigator says has created ''real fear out there,'' an Ontario court ruled corporate officers, directors and advisers facing a shareholder class action are required to hand over potentially damning non-public information to plaintiffs' lawyers before the lawsuit has even been certified.

The path to S&P/TSX composite membership

RICHARD BLACKWELL 

What are the criteria for adding or deleting stocks from the SandP/TSX composite index?There is a set of specific rules that govern which of the hundreds of companies that trade on the TSX end up in the SandP/TSX composite index.

Demers jumps Ogilvy for OMERS

Ogilvy Renault LLP rainmaker Jacques Demers is about to become one of the most popular deal makers in Canada. Tomorrow, the Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System plans to announce a new strategic fund backed by billions of dollars of investment funds. Yes, that's right, billions of dollars of money waiting to be spent on businesses during the century's worst credit crisis. Bar Talk understands Mr. Demers has been tapped to head the new fund. It is understood that the fund, whose name is not yet known, will help co-ordinate OMERS' existing investments in real estate and infrastructure ventures and help search for once-in-a-lifetime opportunities among the growing list of cash-starved companies.

Stores aim to convert 'cherry pickers'

MARINA STRAUSS 

Going into a Zellers store at the beginning of the month it would have been hard to miss the boxes of canned Coke stacked near the entrance, at a bargain price of three for $9.99. Or the Pot of Gold chocolates at 30-per-cent off.

Brookfield's Cockwell unbowed amid crisis

LORI McLEOD 

After half a century as one of the country's shrewdest business strategists, Jack Cockwell, group chairman at Brookfield Asset Management Inc., has a sharp eye for opportunity.He sees the current turmoil in credit markets as a pivotal time during which careers will be made and companies strengthened, Mr. Cockwell said before an event in Toronto yesterday at which he was named as one of six people to be inducted into the Canadian Business Hall of Fame.

Telus sees opportunity in medical data

SIMON AVERY 

Telus Corp. is strengthening its push beyond the phone business with a $100-million investment to develop technology for electronic medical records.The money will be spent over three years on software and other tools to digitize health care information and share it between hospitals, doctors' offices and patients.

Pension plan volatility not an 'aberration'

JANET McFARLAND 

The volatility in pension plan funding in recent years should not be dismissed as an ''aberration'' but is a sign that Canada needs to rethink fundamental elements of its pension system, a Toronto seminar heard yesterday.

Small-town folks found more hopeful

JENNIFER WELLS 

Feeling ignored?Bothered by a mounting sense that marketers are not that into you?You may be on to something, especially if you live in a city of fewer than 100,000 souls.

Bombardier client stalls plane order

BERTRAND MAROTTE 

Horizon Air Industries Inc.'s disclosure that it wants to defer the purchase of several Bombardier Inc. Q400 turboprops is the latest sign that the global economic turmoil is eating into aircraft manufacturers' order backlogs.

Syncrude reaches royalty deal

NORVAL SCOTT 

Syncrude Canada Ltd., which operates Canada's single largest oil sands project, has reached a new royalty deal with the provincial government that brings it more in line with a new system that takes effect in January.

Brokerage appeals IIROC review

JANET McFARLAND 

Winnipeg brokerage firm Jory Capital Inc. is appealing conditions imposed by Canada's brokerage industry watchdog when it put the firm under ''early warning review'' earlier this month.The Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada (IIROC) said yesterday that it will hold a hearing Nov. 26 to review an order imposed Nov. 3 that put the firm under review.

CTV plans layoffs, cuts as it braces for slump

GRANT ROBERTSON 

A week after its biggest rival announced layoffs, CTV Inc. is preparing to cut costs across its network by chopping discretionary expenses, imposing a hiring freeze and eliminating jobs.It is not known how many layoffs will be made, but the move comes as the TV sector braces for one of its deepest slumps since the early 1990s as advertising revenues dry up amid an economic slowdown.

Car troubles

The Canadian financial wing of struggling auto maker Chrysler is closing offices in three cities and doing all of the work out of Toronto in a cost-cutting move that will affect 145 workers. Chrysler Financial Canada said yesterday it will close its business centre in Calgary immediately, followed by its Montreal and Windsor, Ont., offices in April, 2009.

Weston won't cut prices as costs remain high

A third of Canadians see lower house prices: survey

John Partridge 

The number of Canadians who now expect housing prices to fall has more than doubled since last spring, a survey by a mortgage brokers group has found. The figure now stands at 35 per cent, the Canadian Association of Accredited Mortgage Professionals (CAAMP) said yesterday in releasing its annual fall survey on consumer perceptions. This is up from 15 per cent in the spring survey, it said. ''Almost one-half of those surveyed gave a neutral answer while the number who thought prices would go up fell from 40 per cent to 20 per cent,'' it said in a news release.

De Beers to cut output at two Canadian mines

Top diamond producer De Beers Canada Inc. expects to cut output at its two new Canadian mines by 10 to 20 per cent because of a recent drop in demand, De Beers Canada chief executive officer Jim Gowans said yesterday. ''We've seen quite a drop in demand,'' Mr. Gowans said in an interview. De Beers, 45-per-cent owned by mining group Anglo American PLC, has begun commercial production of diamonds this year at its Snap Lake mine in Northwest Territories and its Victor mine in Northern Ontario - two of the four diamond mines operating in Canada.

CanWest names Viner interim head of TV

CanWest Global Communications Corp. has named veteran company executive Peter Viner interim president of its broadcasting division. He is coming out of retirement to replace Kathy Dore, who is leaving in December after four years as head of TV operations. CanWest had said in August that Ms. Dore would be leaving. She had the distinction of being CanWest's highest-paid executive in its financial year ended August, 2007, earning $3.7-million plus share options while chief executive officer Leonard Asper earned $2.2-million plus options. CGS (TSX) fell 4 cents to 72 cents.

Scary times? Try being on your own

WALLACE IMMEN 

Amy Casson fled corporate life to become a self-employed business trainer four years ago, and has never looked back - until now.Running her own consultancy, Polished Image Inc. in London, Ont., Ms. Casson has worked on short-term contracts doing employee training in presentation and communication skills. The work has been lucrative, gave her more work-life flexibility and, when one contract ended, there was no shortage of other clients, she says.

The Oracle of Omaha in all his human frailty

HARVEY SCHACHTER 

THE SNOWBALLBy Alice SchroederBantam, 960 pages, $39.95When Warren Buffett was nine, he caught some snowflakes in his glove and rolled them into a ball. Then he pushed that ball across his lawn, beyond his house and into his neighbourhood, watching it grow bigger and bigger and bigger.

Better the job you know than the one you don't

Nearly two-thirds - 61 per cent - of U.S. middle managers say they fear losing their jobs or morale is down because of the economy, a survey finds.Yet, just 13 per cent of them are actively looking for a new job.

Techies opt for e-mail over in-person at the office: poll

How do information technology staff like to communicate at the office? Nearly half - 49 per cent - prefer e-mail, while 34 per cent want an in-person conversation, a survey finds.

The weekly web poll

LAST WEEK'S QUESTION:In the uncertain economy, are you seeing evidence of cutbacks in your workplace?Yes: 60%No: 40%Total votes: 6,551THIS WEEK'S QUESTION:Are you going to take advantage of a flu shot through work?

ET CETERA

''I have seen two bad recessions and in the classes that graduate in these times, you get the real leaders.''Jay Light, dean of Harvard Business School. Page 4

TransCanada takes a long-term view on energy

STEVE LADURANTAYE 

TransCanada Corp. did the seemingly impossible this week, handily raising $1-billion on a depressed stock market to help finance a pipeline from Alberta to the Gulf of Mexico. Here's a closer look at the company, and what it plans to do with the money.

As yield goes up, watch out for dividend cuts

STEVE LADURANTAYE 

WHAT ARE WE LOOKING FOR?Stocks with a high yield, which could indicate a dividend cut is on the horizon. Yesterday, we looked at stocks on the SandP/TSX (excluding income trusts). Today, let's look at companies in the Dow Jones industrial average.

The way it's going for Nortel, maybe it's time to turn out the lights

FABRICE TAYLOR 

Analysts are starting to say so and even Nortel's accountants admit it: The company is worthless. Why does it still have any market value left?RBC Dominion Securities Inc.'s analyst cut Nortel's price target to zero last week. He called his report ''The last one,'' which kind of sums it up. That downgrade came on the heels of another bloodletting quarter: Nortel lost another $3.4-billion (U.S.) in the third quarter and is down $3.7-billion for the year so far.

Recreational vehicle sector littered with roadkill

BENJ GALLANDER AND BEN STADELMANN 

The lure of the open road. Adventure around the next bend. The independence of a full tank of fuel and nobody telling you where to go. That ethos might sound like a born-to-be-wild biker, but it is also the tune of the more prosaic millions who satisfy their wanderlust by enjoying life on the road in a recreational vehicle.

Behold the magic moving average: It's not perfect, but it's close

JOHN HEINZL 

Wouldn't it be nice if there was a nearly foolproof way to know when the stock market has bottomed? A signal that, with almost 100 per cent accuracy, could tell us when the carnage was over and a new bull market had begun?

U.S. price data forecast to plunge

ALLAN ROBINSON 

U.S. consumer price index (CPI) data, to be released today, are expected to show deflation risks are on the rise and that opens the way for another rate cut by the U.S. Federal Reserve Board as well as lower regulated rates globally.

Farm prices forecast to rebound

CHRISTOPHER JOHNSON 

JPMorgan Chase and Co. expects agricultural commodity prices to outperform industrial raw materials and oil next year and has cut forecasts for crude due to what it calls ''an endless chain of bearish economic data.'' It expects precious metals to be the worst-performing commodities sector over the next year.

EYE ON EQUITIES: STOCKS THAT SHOULD BE ON YOUR RADAR SCREEN

ALLAN ROBINSON 

GRANDE CACHE COAL: (GCE-TSX)Yesterday's close78cents, down 7centsGrande Cache Coal Corp. could see its coking coal price for 2009 plunge to $139 (U.S.) a tonne from $220, said Canaccord Capital analyst Gary Lampard. Canaccord also expects fiscal 2010 and 2011 production to fall 12 per cent and 25 per cent, respectively.

COMMODITIES

Oil prices continued to fall as a U.S. government report showed that gasoline prices in October plunged further than they ever have and home heating oil, natural gas and liquefied petroleum gas also fell substantially.

TIP SHEET

David Berman 

Research In Motion Ltd. has been rolling out new wireless devices as it battles Apple Inc.'s iPhone - but investors haven't been applauding the moves. The stock has fallen about two-thirds since mid-June., making it one of the bigger technology casualties.

TUESDAY'S MARKETS: WHAT HAPPENED

(Up)Financial stocks help SandP/TSX edge higherThe SandP/TSX composite index closed at 8,835.73, up 40.28 points or 0.5 per cent. Financials were mostly stronger, with Royal Bank of Canada up 0.4 per cent, Bank of Montreal up 1.5 per cent, and Manulife Financial Corp. up 6.2 per cent.

BONDS

Canada's 10-year government bonds rose after a report showed prices paid to U.S. producers plummeted in October, increasing speculation deflation is more likely to take root in the economy than inflation.

FOREIGN EXCHANGE CROSS RATES

The dollar closed at its lowest level in a week against the U.S. greenback as growing prospects of a global recession, following sharp slides in prices for the commodities that Canada exports, convinced traders to unwind gains recorded in the previous session.