Thursday Evening Business Brief

February 7, 2013, 5:19 PM

The stock market rally which has pushed indexes close to record levels has stalled. Stocks fell today as weaker earnings and worries about Europe overshadowed healthier signs for the U.S. economy. The Dow Jones industrial average lost 42 points to 13,944. The Standard and Poor's 500 fell 3 points to 1,509 and the Nasdaq composite also dropped 3 points.
The price of oil has fallen below $96 per barrel after the head of the European Central Bank expressed concern over a recent rise in the euro. That hurts ECU export prospects and also tends to result in higher oil prices by making crude priced in dollars cheaper. Benchmark crude for March delivery fell 79 cents to finish at $95.83 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
The big storm heading for the Northeast is already disrupting air travel. United Airlines says it has already canceled 900 flights for Friday. Delta has canceled 135, plus more regional flights. American Airlines is also canceling flights. Airports with the most cancellations on Friday are Newark Liberty, Boston's Logan International and LaGuardia, in that order, according to airline tracking website FlightAware.
Magazine industry auditors say more U.S. magazines are selling more digital copies, but they still represented just 2.4 percent of circulation in the second half of last year as overall circulation was largely unchanged. The 289 magazine titles selling digital copies sold 7.9 million digital copies, up from 3.2 million. The Alliance for Audited Media says the top circulation magazines were the senior-focused AARP the Magazine and AARP Bulletin, with more than 22 million each.
Federal prosecutors in Philadelphia say a jailed German billionaire and another hedge fund executive defrauded institutional investors of more than $300 million. An indictment filed today says K1 hedge fund group founder Helmut Kiener partnered with John Tausche of Blowing Rock, N.C., to swindle Barclays Bank, Bear Stearns and BNP Paribas out of $311 billion. Tausche's lawyer says he's cooperating with the government.

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