Financial thoughts

This is a weekly roundup of accomplishments and deals by businesses in the Birmingham metro area. For more announcements, check out the Birmingham Business Journal’s print edition each week. Send announcements to ccrawford@bizjournals.com.

FITNESS

Iron Tribe Fitness opened in Birmingham in February and now has a membership of 200 clients. It is one of 1,700 affiliates of the CrossFit network worldwide. Iron Tribe founder Forrest Walden opened his first Fitness Together franchise in 2001 and, by 2009, he had developed 55 locations in three states that participate in Iron Tribe Fitness.

NONPROFITS

The Alabama Association of Nonprofits has formed a new partnership with the Internal Revenue Service to help educate the more than 21,000 nonprofit organizations in Alabama about how to protect their tax-exempt status and comply with tax obligations on the heels of recent announcements about exemption revocations by the IRS. The association and the IRS will host a seminar in Birmingham Sept. 14 entitled “How to Lose Your Tax-Exempt Status (Without Really Trying).” Registration for the session is open at www.alabamanonprofits.org.

RETAIL

The state’s first Neighborhood Market, located in Center Point, reopened July 23 after a major three-month remodeling project. The store distributed grants to local organizations as part of the reopening. The store hired about 30 associates to help with the remodel. It employs approximately 90 associates.

TECHNOLOGY

TekLinks, a regional IT services provider headquartered in Birmingham, achieved the Cisco Channel Customer Satisfaction Excellence for the eighth consecutive year low interest personal loan.

More than 200 people are expected to attend this year’s BarCampBirmingham conference. The event will take place from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. at Innovation Depot, 1500 First Ave. N., downtown. Free tickets are available in limited supply by visiting barcampbirmingham.org.

UNIVERSITIES

The University of Alabama at Birmingham developed a new Advanced Placement Scholarship Program for Birmingham City School System seniors, using income generated from an endowed fund made possible by an anonymous $4 million cash gift designated for scholarships for women and minorities. The first students to participate in the program will be eligible to receive their scholarships for the fall 2011 term.

Funding has been extended and expanded for the aerospace crew, robotics, avionics and equipment work performed by UAB’s Center for Biophysical Sciences and Engineering for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The new contract is valued at more than $70 million and is shared among UAB and three out-of-state engineering firms.

UTILITIES

Southern Co. employees held a food drive for the Birmingham Salvation Army and dropped off more than 1,000 food items. The drive was a competition between six departments at Southern Co. and was called “Put Your Manager to Work,” because the managers had to stack and organize the nonperishable food.

Source

Compare health insurance plans and insurance rates on family and individual health insurance. Free health quotes and more.

Shares of American Apparel plummeted another 21% Wednesday, on top of a comparable drop the previous day, as the casual clothing chain said accounting troubles that have put it on the brink of closing have led to investigations.

American Apparel (APP) shares were off 22 cents to 81 cents. The stock dropped 22% Wednesday when the Los Angeles-based retailer said a steep sales slump and manufacturing problems could cause the company to default on its loans.

In a government filing Tuesday, American Apparel said the U. S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York sent it a subpoena relating to the circumstances around Deloitte & Touche’s resignation as the company’s auditor last month.

The filing also said the Securities and Exchange Commission has made inquiries into the situation.

American Apparel said Deloitte is investigating the "reliability" of the company’s consolidated financial statements for all of 2009, the company’s financial results for the first quarter of 2010 and its projected financial results for the rest of 2010 instant payday loans.

Officials for the U.S. Attorney’s office in New York and the SEC both declined comment. Deloitte representatives did not immediately return a call for comment.

Defaulting on its loans could sink the company within the next 12 months, the company said. American Apparel added it is in talks with its creditors to amend its loan agreements.

American Apparel said it expects to post a loss from operations of between $5 million to $7 million for the second quarter. It also warned losses from operations would continue into its third quarter. 

Source

The team at Payday Loan Company is ready to tell anyone yes for a payday loans or cash advance for up to $1000 cash.

Gasoline prices are continuing their lazy ascent in Western New York.

Gas is selling for an average of $2.858 per gallon in Erie and Niagara counties as of Monday morning, according to the American Automobile Association.

That’s up seven-tenths of a cent from a week ago. The local average on Aug. 9 was $2.851.

And it’s up 1.2 cents from a month ago, when gas prices averaged $2.846 in the Buffalo area.

AAA issues daily price estimates for metropolitan areas across the country, based on its survey of credit-card purchases at self-service stations.

Source

Weyerhaeuser Co. said it’s selling six of its railroads that operate over about 160 miles of track, to Patriot Rail Corp.

The Federal Way timber giant (NYSE: WY) said it’s selling the six railroads, including two in Southwest Washington, to Boca Raton, Fla.-based Patriot for an undisclosed sum.

The six railroads handle about 60,000 carloads of freight annually, Weyerhaeuser said, and they employ about 120 people total.

The railroads in the sale include:

— The DeQueen and Eastern Railroad Company consists of two railroads — the DeQueen and Eastern and the Texas, Oklahoma & Eastern railroads — that operate over a total of 87 route miles in southeast Oklahoma and southwest Arkansas;

— The Columbia & Cowlitz Railway operates over 8 payday loan.5 route miles in Southwest Washington;

— The Weyerhaeuser Woods Railroad operates over 30 route miles in Southwest Washington.

— The Golden Triangle Railroad operates over 13.3 route miles in central Mississippi; and

— The Mississippi & Skuna Valley Railroad owns 21 route miles in Mississippi.

Patriot said that the railroads primarily source Weyerhaeuser and International Paper mills, move finished products and serve some third-party customers.

Source

Sensor technology developed by Southwest Research Institute has been named one of the 100 most significant technological achievements by R&D Magazine.

Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) created an underwater cave-mapping sensor that has the capability of traveling down a cave to gauge the path, dimensions and morphology of the tunnel. SwRI officials say these remote neutrally buoyant sensors work by injecting a dye in the water that can be used to determine the path and travel time of water through caves. The sensors are designed to float through the cave or conduit to measure the path by using an array of ultrasound sensors.

Local scientists say cave diving is extremely dangerous and is limited to large passageways, relatively shallow caves and limited distances.

“The information captured from these sensors is critically important for water-resource management and geotechnical risk assessment,” says Ronald Green, a scientist in the geosciences and engineering division at SwRI and a principal developer of the sensor paperless payday loans. “Adequate management of karst aquifers requires knowledge of water flow through caves and conduits, including location, size and morphology of the complex interconnected voids.”

SwRI officials say there could be applications in pipelines or sanitary sewers. Also, there could be future applications in flooded underground mines, tunnels or conduits that are not safe for manned entry.

San Antonio-based SwRI is an independent, nonprofit applied research and development organization. It has more than 3,200 employees and an annual research volume of more than $564 million. The institute has won 35 R&D 100 Awards since 1971. SwRI will accept its 2010 R&D Award Nov. 11 in Orlando.

Source

U.S. stocks were set for a lower open Tuesday, ahead of another batch of corporate earnings.

Dow Jones industrial average (INDU), S&P 500 (SPX) and Nasdaq (COMP) futures were all down ahead of the opening bell.

Futures measure current index values against perceived future performance.

Stocks ended Monday’s session with gains, although economic worries tempered positive earnings results.

"Earnings are a mixed picture right now, and people are still trying to determine whether we are seeing signs of the economy recovering," said Derek Hoffman, founder of The Wall Street Cheat Sheet. "There’s a lot of uncertainty, so investors are sitting on the sidelines and buying into companies based on these earnings, and that’s really what is moving the market from day to day."

Earnings: Companies due to report their results Tuesday include Wall Street firm Goldman Sachs (GS, Fortune 500) and tech heavyweights Apple (AAPL, Fortune 500) and Yahoo (YHOO, Fortune 500).

After U.S. markets closed Monday, IBM (IBM, Fortune 500) posted a jump in second-quarter earnings, but the tech bellwether’s sales fell short of estimates.

Economy: A reading on housing starts and building permits from the Department of Commerce comes out at 8:30 a.m. ET.

Economists surveyed by Briefing.com expect permits to have edged down to an annual rate of 572,000 in June from 574,000 in the previous month, while housing starts are forecast to have dropped to a 575,000 rate from 593,000.

A state unemployment report from the Department of Labor is due out at 10 a.m. ET.

World markets: European shares were lower in midday trading. The FTSE 100 in Britain lost 0.5%, France’s CAC 40 dropped 1.1% and Germany’s DAX fell 0.9%.

Asian markets ended mixed. The Shanghai Composite rallied 2.2% but Japan’s Nikkei tumbled 1.2%. The Hang Seng in Hong Kong added 0.9%.

Dollar and commodities: The dollar was up against the euro, the British pound and the Japanese yen.

U.S. light crude oil for August delivery edged down 2 cents to $76.52 a barrel.

COMEX gold’s August contract fell $2.60 to $1,179.30 per ounce.

Bonds: Treasury prices rose, pushing the yield on the 10-year note down to 2.95% from 2.96% late Monday. Bond prices and yields move in opposite directions.

How much of a hit did you take in the recent correction? Are you worried about a bear market? What changes have you made in your portfolio and what changes do you plan on making for the rest of the year? E-mail your story to realstories@cnnmoney.com and you could be featured in an upcoming article. For the CNNMoney.com Comment Policy, click here. 

Source

Community Bank of the Bay raised more than $7.7 million and added five directors to its board.

The Oakland bank, which expanded into Danville and San Jose in recent months, raised the money from local residents, primarily in the bank’s new markets in the greater Bay Area. CEO Brian Garrett didn’t mince words in discussing the challenge community banks face in raising money today.

“It was a herculean effort to raise capital in this environment,” Garrett said. “Most of the capital came from the new markets we have entered. This is a confirmation of the reputation of the bankers who have joined us from these markets.”

The new board members are William Purcell, president of Walnut Creek-based Purcell International, a food importer and brokerage; Dr. Eddie Cheung, a clinical professor at the U.C. Davis School of Medicine; Gunter Unruh, president and owner of Metric Design and Manufacturing in Campbell; Arthur Lund, an attorney with the San Jose law firm Hoge Fenton Jones and Appel and a former director of Greater Bay Bancorp, now part of Wells Fargo; (NYSE: WFC) Tracey Enfantino, general manager of Environmental Systems Inc no faxing payday loans. and a founder of Heritage Bank of Commerce, (NASDAQ: HTBK) serving on that bank’s board from 1994 to 2003.

Community Bank of the Bay (OTC BB: CBYAA.OB) plans to use the new capital to boost lending.

“We anticipate that the additional capital will be used to increase lending to small and medium-sized businesses,” said William Keller, president and chief operating officer of the bank.

Source

New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner has died, Bay News 9 is reporting.

The 80-year-old Steinbrenner had been the owner of the New York Yankees since 1973. During that time, the Yankees won 11 pennants and seven World Series titles. Steinbrenner is also known for his philanthropy in the Tampa Bay area paydayloans.

Earlier Tuesday Bay News 9 reported that Tampa Fire Rescue responded to a call at Steinbrenner's house and that someone was transported to St. Joseph's Hospital.

Source

AirTran Airways reported that passenger traffic grew by 7.4 percent for June and 7.9 percent for the second quarter of 2010, both up from the year-ago periods.

The Orlando-based airline’s traffic and load factor — how full its planes were — represent new all-time records for the month of June and the second quarter, according to an AirTran release. June traffic grew by 7.4 percent to more than 1.8 billion revenue passenger miles. The company’s load factor for the month was 86.4 percent.

For the second quarter, traffic grew by 7 payday loans guaranteed no fax.9 percent to more than 5.2 billion revenue passenger miles, and the airline’s load factor was 83.1 percent.

Enplaned passengers also represent a new second-quarter company record. The airline enplaned more than 6.5 million passengers, a 5.3 percent increase from the second quarter of 2009.

AirTran Airways is a subsidiary of AirTran Holdings Inc. (NYSE: AAI) and a Fortune 1000 company.

Source

Hawker Beechcraft Corp. has sent out 130 layoff notices, according to paperwork filed with the Kansas Department of Commerce.

Shelly Thompson, adult services coordinator with the department, says the state received the paperwork Friday, but that it was dated Thursday. That means, she says, the 60-day notices will take effect August 31 cash advance flexible payments.

Hawker spokesperson Nicole Alexander confirmed that WARN notices had gone out to hourly employees, but said the company would not offer further details.

Source