New Jersey Business News

Latest local and international economic news, market & financial reports

The U.S. Patent & Trademark Office today said it will accept drugmaker Pfizer Inc.'s application to correct a technical defect in one of the patents involving Pfizer's cholesterol medicine Lipitor, the world's top-selling drug.

The decision would result in reissuance of the patent and maintain the patent's June 2011 expiration date, crucial to Pfizer because Lipitor brings the company nearly $13 billion in annual revenue.

Sealed Air Corp., the Elmwood Park-based maker of Bubble Wrap shipping products, plans to close its Cedar Rapids, Iowa, factory within six to 10 months.

Work at the plant will be relocated to other North American facilities, Sealed Air said today in a U.S. regulatory filing. The company said it hadn't determined how much the closing will cost.

Pending U.S. home sales fell to the lowest level on record in November, as the plummeting stock market and faltering economy caused buyers to delay their purchases, the National Association of Realtors said today.

The index, which tracks signed contracts to purchase existing homes, fell 4 percent to 82.3 from a downwardly revised October reading of 85.7 in October. That was far worse than the reading of 88 that economists expected, according to Thomson Reuters.

A federal judge in Louisville, Ky., has dismissed a challenge to the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement between states and 19 tobacco product makers.

U.S. District Judge Jennifer Coffman issued the ruling today. Coffman said the lawsuit brought by North Carolina-based General Tobacco failed on all fronts because the company couldn't prove the settlement amounted to anticompetitive behavior by the government.

General Tobacco, the sixth-largest tobacco company in the United States, sued 52 attorneys general and the tobacco makers saying the agreement stifled competition by making it more expensive for new entrants to the industry. The company had asked for more than $1 billion.

Best Buy Co., the largest U.S. electronics retailer, plans to sell refurbished Apple Inc. iPhones for $50 less than new models.

Previously owned 8-gigabyte iPhones will go on sale today for $149 and 16-gigabyte versions for $249 in 350 U.S. Best Buy stores. Sales will expand to all 1,000 stores by the end of the month, Scott Moore, marketing vice president for the company's mobile division, said Monday in a telephone interview. The purchase requires a two-year service contract with AT&T Inc., the phone's sole wireless service provider in the U.S.

AP photo Apple iPhone 3G.

AP PhotoPresident-elect Barack Obama, flanked by Treasury Secretary-designate Timothy Geithner, left, and Council of Economic Advisers Chair-designate Christina Romer, meets with members of his economic team at his transition office in Washington, Monday, Jan. 5, 2009.

The refunds are popular among business groups and could increase pressure on Republicans to support Obama's massive stimulus package, even though most of them are wary of government spending increases that could send its total cost to $800 billion or more.

"This gives companies an infusion of cash just when they need it," Dorothy Coleman of the National Association of Manufacturers said of the proposed refunds.

Continental Airlines Inc., the biggest carrier at Newark Liberty International Airport, and AMR Corp.'s American Airlines joined five U.S. carriers in a lawsuit seeking to reverse government safety rules for international flights.

The Federal Aviation Administration acted arbitrarily last year when it imposed new crew-rest rules and other regulations for long-distance flights, including American's route between Chicago and Delhi, and Continental flights connecting Newark with Hong Kong and Mumbai, according to the suit filed in a federal appeals court in Washington.