The U.K. government should aim to balance its budget two years earlier than currently planned to calm investor concerns the country could lose its top-notch credit rating, the Confederation for British Industry said.
The budget deficit should be eradicated by March 2016, the London-based employers’ group said in proposals submitted to Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling before his budget this month. This should be achieved through spending cuts and reforms to public services rather than tax increases, it said.
“There is a need to restore macro-economic stability and that depends on getting current levels of government borrowing down,” CBI Director General Richard Lambert told a press conference in London on March 4. “The government is not ambitious enough on that front. It hasn’t set out its spending plans in enough detail. The 2017 date is too far away.”
With an election due by June, the debate over how to tame a deficit equal to Greece’s has taken center stage as some investors and the opposition Conservatives warn Britain’s credit rating is at risk.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown has pledged to halve the gap, set to exceed 12 percent of economic output this year, by March 2014 and says Conservative plans to begin spending cuts this year risk plunging the economy into a “double-dip recession.”
“The economy is still in a very fragile shape,” Lambert said. While the CBI is not proposing “any silver bullets in the short-term,” the process of cutting the deficit “should get under way seriously in 2011.”
Poll Outlook
Polls suggest Britain may be heading for its first minority government since 1974, sparking concern that efforts to cut the deficit may be compromised.
“The scale of our budget deficit and the likely tightening we are going to need does look a lot more serious than in any other G-7 country,” Lambert says. “We are confident that the U.K.’s credit rating is sustainable. The big picture is to get credibility.”
A survey showed that 86 percent of U.K. business leaders said that current levels of public spending needed to be reduced, while 72 percent said cuts should start this year, the Institute of Directors said in a separate e-mailed report today. The lobby group, which questioned 1,500 people between Feb. 26 and March 4, also found that 71 percent said the deficit was a top priority of a new government in its first 100 days.
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India’s credit rating may be raised from junk if Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee provides a comprehensive plan to roll back fiscal stimulus and cut the budget deficit this week, Moody’s Investors Service said.
“If we think the exit path is well articulated and well executed, the local currency rating could be upgraded,” Aninda Mitra, a Singapore-based sovereign analyst at Moody’s, said in a telephone interview on Feb. 19. India’s long-term local currency debt is placed at Ba2 by Moody’s, two levels below the investment grade and at par with Armenia and Turkey.
Mukherjee has an opportunity to narrow the budget shortfall as accelerating economic growth boosts tax revenue and a stronger political mandate after last year’s elections paves the way to resume asset sales. Rating changes have less impact on India than other countries like Greece, which borrow more from abroad. India’s foreign borrowings make up only about 4 percent of government debt compared with 83 percent for Greece, according to Citigroup Inc.
Stocks, Bonds Gain
“India has lived with a budget deficit for so long, and with a high growth rate you can run a deficit,” said Andrew Michael Spence, a Nobel prize-winning economist and professor emeritus at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business. “You don’t want the credit rating to go too low. It’s more signaling rather than anything else.”
India’s budget deficit may narrow to 5.5 percent of gross domestic product in the financial year starting April 1 from 6.8 percent of GDP in the previous year, Chakravarthy Rangarajan, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s top economic adviser, said on Feb. 19. Mukherjee is scheduled to unveil the budget in parliament in New Delhi on Feb. 26 at 11 a.m.
Stocks snapped a two-day decline while the yield on India’s benchmark 10-year note fell the most in more than four weeks after Moody’s comment. The rupee gained the most since Feb. 15.
India’s Sensitive Index rose 1.1 percent to 16,369 on the Bombay Stock Exchange and the rupee appreciated 0.3 percent to 46.14 per dollar. Bond yields fell four basis points to 7.84 percent as of 1:24 p.m. in Mumbai.
Indian government debt accounts for about 80 percent of the gross domestic product. Standard & Poor’s and Fitch Ratings have a BBB-, the lowest investment grade rating, on Indian local currency debt.
Positive Outlook
“Although the debt level is high relative to other emerging markets, the fact remains that it’s not increasing sharply,” Mitra said. “It’s hovering around 80 percent of the GDP. So, that’s a reasonably good outcome and which is why we shifted towards the positive outlook,” in December 2009.
Mukherjee, who allowed the budget deficit to widen to provide fiscal stimulus to the economy amid a global recession, is relying on asset sales and faster growth to spur tax collections in next year’s budget.
India’s $1.2 trillion economy may grow 7.2 percent in the current fiscal year through March, accelerating for the first time since 2007, the statistics office said Feb. 8.
Singh’s government plans to reduce stakes in 68 companies including NMDC Ltd., the nation’s largest iron-ore producer, and NTPC Ltd., the biggest electricity provider, after he returned to power in May without the help of communist parties, who as part of the previous coalition had opposed the policy.
Inflation Risk
The government may borrow a net 3.8 trillion rupees in the year starting April 1, compared with 3.97 trillion rupees this year, said Abheek Barua, an economist at the Mumbai-based HDFC Bank Ltd.
Central bank Governor Duvvuri Subbarao last month urged the finance ministry to cut borrowings to support the monetary policy’s goal to contain inflation. Subbarao raised the proportion of deposits lenders need to maintain as cash reserves to 5.75 percent from 5 percent and said monetary policy alone won’t be effective in curbing price-gains unless Mukherjee rolls back fiscal stimulus.
“The growth has rebounded and at the same time there is a risk of inflation,” Mitra said. “Inflation expectations need to be anchored better, either through higher policy rates or if that process could be helped by lower government borrowing and spending.”
India’s inflation accelerated to 8.56 percent in January, the most in 15 months.
“India in on the cusp of a new tryst, which is fiscal destiny, and I hope they will take it,” Mitra said.
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Hot or iced, with whipped topping or not — Seattle’s Best Coffee fans can soon have it their way.
Burger King (BKC) will start serving up the Starbucks (SBUX, Fortune 500)-owned brand at 7,250 of its restaurants across the United States by September, for $1 to $2.79 a cup, the company announced today.
"The addition of Seattle’s Best Coffee expands on our ‘Have it Your Way’ brand promise by offering our guests even more beverage options and strengthens our ability to remain competitive in a continuously changing industry," the restaurant chain’s senior marketing VP, John Schaufelberger, said in a statement.
The news comes amid a weak economy in which consumers seem to be pinching pennies and avoiding burgers, soda and beer.
Last week McDonald’s posted same-store sales were down 0.7% in January in its U.S. restaurants. Burger King competes with McDonalds’ McCafe to attract morning customers. Burger King doesn’t post monthly figures, but showed same-store sales in the U.S. and Canada were down 3.3% in the second quarter of 2010.
Seattle’s Best Coffee will replace Burger King’s BK Joe coffee menu, launched in 2005.
The sandwich chain Subway also signed a deal with Seattle’s Best back in November and now sells its coffee in 8,500 stores.
The St. Louis area, which has a soft spot for mostaccioli and ravioli, has been one of the top-performing markets for Fazoli’s, the Italian quick-service restaurant chain based in Lexington, Ky.
That’s why Carl Howard, Fazoli’s chief executive, picked this region for the chain’s first new store in more than 3 years.
The new outlet, which opened this week in Edwardsville, is also the first to debut the chain’s new prototype. The new design is smaller than the old model, located in strip centers instead of a stand-alone building, and has a brighter, more modern decor.
"This is a fresh look for us," Howard said in an interview during a visit to the new store. "Our old facility is a little bit stale. We wanted to juice it up and have some fun."
Fazoli’s has undergone more than just a face-lift. In the last year, it has also overhauled about 80 percent of its menu, adding new items such as baked pasta dishes. It has also started using fresher ingredients and revamped everything, from the submarino sandwiches to the marinara sauce.
Fazoli’s had become quiet over the years, Howard acknowledged. Its menu hadn’t kept up with the growing sophistication of the public’s palate. And the previous leaders of the chain let the brand grow stagnant as they sought a buyer for the company, he said.
In 2006, Fazoli’s was finally sold to Sun Capital Partners. Howard came in as CEO two years later. When he took over, the chain had been grappling with declining customer counts for several years at its 280-plus locations. One of his first major decisions was to shut down dozens of underperforming stores. Fazoli’s now has closer to 240 outlets and does $239 million in sales.
"You get rid of your dogs and stick with your stars and all of a sudden your numbers and performance begins to improve," said Darren Tristano, executive vice president of Technomic, a Chicago-based food consultant group.
Now customer visits have been consistently rising since January 2009, Howard said, though he declined to say by how much.
The new Edwardsville site will be followed by six to eight other new Fazoli’s in the next year or so in other strong markets for the company such as Kansas City, and Dayton and
Columbus, Ohio, Howard said.
"We have a Midwest appeal." Howard said. "We have real comfort food."
St. Louis, which now has nine Fazoli’s locations, is the chain’s third-largest market in terms of number of stores, behind only Indianapolis and Lexington.
Kim Tucci, president of St. Louis-based The Pasta House Co., isn’t sweating it as Fazoli’s angles for a larger local presence.
The Pasta House has a very similar logo to Fazoli’s — a fat, red tomato — and has about 20 locations in the metro area and another dozen outside the region. Tucci said his competitors are more along the lines of Macaroni Grill — and not Fazoli’s, which he equated to a fast-food chain like McDonald’s.
"This is like apples and watermelons," he said. "You can’t compare it to what we have — nothing against them."
Tucci added that it makes sense for Fazoli’s to be aggressive in this economy because of their lower price points. The average bill per person at Fazoli’s is just under $6.
Like most other restaurants, Pasta House has been feeling the pinch of the recession as people eat out less. Tucci has responded by lowering his prices. In late December, Pasta House started a promotion offering six pastas for under $6.
"We’re hanging in there," Tucci said. "We’re hustling everyday, 24-7."
As a whole, fast food and fast-casual outlets have done well during the recession — better than the traditional, sit-down restaurants, Tristano said.
The prototype for the new Fazoli’s is about 2,100 square feet — roughly a quarter smaller than their older locations of between 2,700 and 3,100 square feet, Howard said.
"It’s a lot more efficient," Howard said.
By having these smaller stores in strip malls, Howard hopes this will be more attractive to franchises. The start-up costs associated with a new location will be closer to $500,000 compared with as much as $1.7 million for land and the building of the older standalone stores.
"It’s going to be easier to replicate," he said. "There’re a lot of shopping strips for us to go rather than fighting for the last great piece of real estate in a market."
Fazoli’s is also testing out some other innovations at the Edwardsville store — slightly lower prices on some items, a new line of pizzas and bringing back the "breadstick person" who goes table to table.
When it opens its new stores in Dayton in the next several weeks, Fazoli’s will try out other new ideas, such as having real tableware and silverware.
If the innovations do well in these new stores, Fazoli’s hopes to roll out the changes to its other company-owned stores. As for the franchises, Howard hopes that the new elements will be such a hit that they will be motivated to follow suit.
Tena Mayberry, the president of Brentwood-based Century II Inc., has been named as CEO of Century’s parent company, Indianapolis-based Fortune Industries Inc.
Mayberry, who was recently named one of Nashville Business Journal’s Women of Influence for 2010, will also continue to serve as president of Century II, and will remain in Brentwood.
She was named Fortune Industries’ president since last year, after the formerly diversified company decided to focus solely on providing professional employer organization services, such as payroll and human resources, to small and mid-sized businesses.
“I am excited to have the opportunity to lead the company through all the strategic plans we put in place,” she told Nashville Business Journal Monday.
She said she expects FFI to grow as the economy recovers, thanks in part to a continued emphasis on sales even while the company was cutting back on other costs.
“I think 2009 is the worst. We can’t have another 2009,” she said. “Everybody I speak with seems to be ready to start talking positively.”
Departing CEO John Fisbeck offered glowing words.
“Tena Mayberry is a proven top executive and one of the most knowledgeable senior managers in the PEO (professional employer organization) industry,” departing CEO John Fisbeck said in a statement. “Under her direction, FFI is one of the few PEO companies that has been profitable for the last year during this difficult economic environment. … She is an inspirational leader with boundless energy and will lead Fortune as it continues to expand in the U.S.”
Mayberry has more than 20 years of management experience, including time with Contract Sales Managers, Kroger Co., and Norrell Temporary Services. She holds a bachelor’s degree in marketing and business management from Tennessee Technological University.
Fortune Industries (AMEX: FFI) is the nation’s fifth-largest publicly traded PEO, representing 14,000 employees in 47 states.
Production in the U.S. rose for a sixth consecutive month, consumers gained confidence and price increases slowed, indicating the economic recovery is being sustained into 2010 without generating inflation.
Output climbed 0.6 percent in December for a second month, according to figures from the Federal Reserve issued today in Washington. The cost of living increased 0.1 percent last month, less than the median forecast of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News, and sentiment reached a four-month high in January, other reports showed.
Manufacturers may ramp up assembly lines in coming months to replenish stockpiles and meet rising global demand that’s lifting profits at companies including Intel Corp. The rebound so far has soaked up a quarter of the excess capacity created by the worst recession since the 1930s, giving the Fed scope to keep interest rates close to zero through the first half of the year.
“The economy is on a pretty good track on the recovery side and inflation is not a problem,” said Nariman Behravesh, chief economist at IHS Global Insight in Lexington, Massachusetts, who correctly forecast the increase in consumer prices. “The Fed can be pretty relaxed, at least for the moment, and focus on making sure this recovery is sustainable.”
Stocks Drop
The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index dropped from a 15-month high after JPMorgan Chase & Co. reported a loss in its retail banking division and a stronger dollar pulled down commodity prices. The S&P 500 was down 1.2 percent to 1,134.75 at 12 p.m. in New York.
The increase in production matched the median forecast of 76 economists surveyed by Bloomberg. Estimates ranged from no change to a gain of 1.1 percent. The stretch of increases at the end of 2009 was the longest in a decade.
Production was propelled by a jump in utility use as temperatures turned colder. Utility demand climbed 5.9 percent, the biggest jump in two decades. December was colder than average, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, prompting Americans to turn up the heat.
Manufacturing dropped 0.1 percent as losses in auto and mineral production offset a 0.9 percent gain in business equipment. Demand for computers, communications gear and semiconductors improved, signaling investment may be picking up.
Another report today showed manufacturing accelerated in the New York Fed region this month. The Fed Bank of New York’s general economic index rose to 15.9 from 4.5 in December. Readings above zero in the so-called Empire State Index signal manufacturing expansion in the state and parts of New Jersey and Connecticut.
‘Solid’ Quarter
“We’re turning up,” said Joseph LaVorgna, chief U small personal loans.S. economist at Deutsche Bank Securities Inc. in New York. “Inventories are the spark of the recovery,” he said, and growth “looks pretty solid for the fourth quarter.”
Intel, the world’s largest chipmaker, yesterday projected bigger first-quarter sales than analysts had estimated, a sign the computer industry has shaken off the effects of the recession. The Santa Clara, California-based company, which supplies chips to more than 80 percent of the world’s computers, expects its profit margin to hit a 10-year high this year as consumers snap up laptops and businesses loosen the purse strings on technology budgets.
“My expectation for 2010 is that we’re going to see robust unit growth,” Chief Financial Officer Stacy Smith said in an interview. “The consumer segments of the market will stay pretty strong, and I do believe we are going to see a resurgence in PC client sales.”
Spare Capacity
Capacity utilization, which measures the proportion of plants in use, increased to 72 percent in December, the highest level in a year, from 71.5 the prior month, the Fed’s production report also showed. It was forecast to rise to 71.8 percent, according to the survey median.
The plant-use rate averaged 80 percent over the past two decades and reached a record low 68.3 percent in June. Excess capacity is one reason economists project inflation will remain low.
The increase in the consumer-price index last month followed a 0.4 percent gain in November, the Labor Department reported. The median forecast of economists surveyed projected a 0.2 percent advance.
Excluding food and energy costs, the so-called core index also increased 0.1 percent. Companies may have little success raising prices with unemployment projected to average 10 percent this year, the highest annual rate in seven decades.
“Consumer pricing pressures remain very subdued,” said Russell Price, a senior economist at Ameriprise Financial Inc. in Detroit, who accurately forecast the rise in the core rate. “It gives the Fed further leeway to continue keeping rates where they are well through 2010.”
The Reuters/University of Michigan preliminary index of consumer sentiment for January increased to 72.8, less than anticipated, from 72.5 in December. The gauge averaged 66.3 last year after reaching a record 28-year low of 55.3 in November 2008.
Boeing Co. said commercial orders will pick up by 2012, after dropping to the lowest level since 1994 last year, as an economic recovery boosts air-travel demand and airlines return to profit.
"We’re starting to see the economy turn around after a really difficult year last year in terms of traffic," Randy Tinseth, Boeing’s marketing chief, said. Growth in travel and cargo shipments this year will translate into airline profits and "then we can start to see an increase in demand for new airplanes in 2012," he said.
Boeing had 142 net orders last year after 121 cancellations, the Chicago-based company said in a statement Thursday. That’s the fewest since 125 orders in 1994, according to spokesman Jim Proulx. The total also trails the 194 that rival Airbus SAS reported as of Nov. 30.
Boeing’s orders fell from 662 in 2008, when Airbus had 777, and from a record high of 1,413 in 2007.
"On a gross-order basis we’re probably in the same ballpark, but clearly we had challenges with some of our programs," with 83 cancellations for the delayed 787 Dreamliner, Tinseth said. The two rivals have generally split the market in the past few years and "I don’t see any major trends in terms of orders this year," he said easy online payday loans.
Airbus also kept the lead in deliveries, which are when planemakers get the bulk of payments. Boeing said it delivered 481 planes in 2009, while Airbus shipped 498, according to a person familiar with the Toulouse, France-based company’s production who declined to be identified because its figures won’t be released until Tuesday. Airbus has held the lead every year since 2003.
Boeing’s deliveries in 2009 rose from 375 in 2008, when factories had been shuttered during a two-month strike by machinists. Even with the recession, Boeing and Airbus combined built a record number of aircraft last year as the long lead time for jets and the threat of penalties for last-minute cancellations protected manufacturing rates.
Both companies are scaling back now to better match demand after airlines pushed back hundreds of delivery dates because of the global economic crisis.
Wall Street surged Monday, starting off the new year on a positive note, after a report showed manufacturing activity is picking up and the weak dollar propelled commodity prices and stocks.
The Dow Jones industrial average (INDU) rallied 156 points, or 1.5%. The S&P 500 index (SPX) rose 18 points, or 1.6%. The Nasdaq composite (COMP) gained 39 points, or 1.7%. All three major gauges closed at 15-month highs.
"The fact that stocks are up so much today is an encouraging sign, but we need to see a few days of follow through," said Will Hepburn, chief investment officer at Hepburn Capital Management.
He said the first few trading sessions of a new year are typically positive and that he wants to see several more days of gains on strong trading volume before he’s willing to say that the rally has recharged.
Stocks fell Thursday in a thinly traded session on the last day of 2009. All financial markets were closed Friday in observance of New Year’s Day.
The last month of 2009 saw stocks churning in a narrow range, managing modest gains, but not really charging ahead like in earlier months.
The market lost some momentum in November and December, Hepburn said. That slowdown coincided with the dollar beginning to firm up and investors opting to close the books early after a difficult year.
A tumultuous 2009 ended with substantial gains. The S&P 500 gained 23.4%, the Dow industrials gained 18.8% and the Nasdaq composite gained 44%.
Stocks are up even more substantially since bottoming in March at the height of the financial market crisis. After closing at a 12-year low on March 9, the Dow gained 59% and the S&P 500 gained 65% through year end. After closing at a 6-year low on the same date, the Nasdaq gained 79%.
Tuesday brings reports on factory orders, pending home sales and auto and truck sales.
Economy: The Institute for Supply Management’s manufacturing index rose to 55.9 in December from 53.6 in November, signifying a wider expansion in the sector. Economists surveyed by Briefing.com thought it would rise to 54.3. Stronger reports were also released in Asia, adding to bets that the global manufacturing sector is recovering.
A separate report from the U.S. government showed that construction spending fell 0.6% in November versus forecasts for a drop of 0.5%. Spending fell 0.5% in October.
On the move: Gains were broad based, with 27 of 30 Dow issues rallying, led by Chevron (CVX, Fortune 500), Exxon Mobil (XOM, Fortune 500), Boeing (BA, Fortune 500), United Technologies (UTX, Fortune 500), IBM (IBM, Fortune 500), Hewlett-Packard (HPQ, Fortune 500), JPMorgan Chase (JPM, Fortune 500) and Wal-Mart Stores (WMT, Fortune 500) business cards.
In other news, Swiss drugmaker Novartis AG plans to take control of Alcon (ACL) by paying $38.5 billion to buy the 77% of the eye care products maker it doesn’t already own. The deal involved Novartis buying out Nestle SA’s 52% stake in Alcon for $28 billion in cash and then merging with Alcon to access the remaining 23% held by minority shareholders.
Alcon shares fell nearly 6%.
Bernanke defends Fed policy: The Federal Reserve chairman said Sunday that the central bank’s decision to keep interest rates very low between 2002 and 2006 was appropriate and not the cause of the housing market bubble.
He said regulation would have been a better way to avert the collapse that ensued when home prices crumbled, leading to massive foreclosures, billions in losses for banks and the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.
The Senate is currently considering Bernanke’s nomination by President Obama for another term as Fed chairman. The Senate Banking Committee already gave its approval last month. His current term ends on Jan. 31.
World markets: Asian markets gained, with the exception of the Hong Kong Hang Seng. In Europe, London’s FTSE 100 rose 1.6%, France’s CAC 40 added 2% and the German DAX rallied 1.5%.
Commodities and the dollar: The dollar tumbled versus other major currencies.
The weaker dollar gave a lift to dollar-traded commodities.
COMEX gold for February delivery settled up $22.10 to $1,118.30 an ounce. Gold closed at an all-time high of $1,218.30 an ounce earlier this month.
U.S. light crude oil for February delivery gained $2.15 to settle at $81.51 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, the highest close since October 2008.
Bonds: Treasury prices rose, lowering the yield on the 10-year note to 3.81% from 3.84% late Thursday. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.
Market breadth was positive. On the New York Stock Exchange, winners beat losers four to one on volume of 1.02 billion shares. On the Nasdaq, advancers topped decliners by over three to one on volume of 1.92 billion shares.
Georgia home prices were essentially flat in October from a month earlier, but are still off significantly from the same period last year, according to a report issued Tuesday.
According to the Standard & Poors/Case-Shiller Home Price Index, the price of a home in Atlanta declined 0.2 percent following monthly rebounds in price over the summer months. Still, prices overall are off 8.1 percent from October 2008, though that figure has narrowed.
The report comes a week after the National Association of Realtors said the sales prices of existing homes in November rose 2.4 percent from the same period last year.
Sales volume was up 33 percent over November 2008, one of the deepest months in the recession, according to the NAR report.
"The turn-around in home prices seen in the Spring and Summer has faded with only seven of the 20 cities seeing month-to-month gains, although all 20 continue to show improvements on a year-over-year basis. All in all, this report should be described as flat," David M. Blitzer, chairman of the index committee at Standard & Poor's, said in a statement.
The annual rate of decline has also improved nationally, and is the ninth straight month of improvement. The 10-city and 20-city composite indices were down 6.4 percent and 7.3 percent, respectively, for October.
Then national price was flat in October compared to September.
Denver was the healthiest market among the 20 cities, posting a 0.1 percent drop in home prices. The decline was 0.6 percent in Dallas, the next-healthiest market, according to the monthly survey.
Las Vegas remained the weakest market among the 20 cities, with a drop of 26.6 percent. It was followed by Phoenix, which saw a price decline of 18.1 percent.
The S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Index tracks sales prices of typical single-family homes in leading metropolitan areas.
A blizzard paralyzed the region Saturday, putting a serious dent in a weekend that was supposed to be filled with holiday events and lots of shopping.
The storm started dumping snow quickly after 10 p.m. Friday, just as the last of the last-minute shoppers left supermarkets, malls and shopping centers across the region.
Ritchie Highway in Glen Burnie was nearly impenetrable as shoppers rushed in to the many shopping centers along the road to buy what they needed for a weekend stuck in the house. The usual toilet paper, bread and milk shared space in the car with Christmas tree and greens bought at the highway’s many tree lots.
By Saturday morning, most people were staying off the road and the cancellations kept pouring in. So far, the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra’s Holiday Spectacular, a musical review known for its dancing Santas, was still on. The BSO’s Web site said it wasn’t making a decision until 11 a.m. on whether to cancel Saturday’s shows personal loan for poor credit. The Ravens didn’t wait long to make a change, announcing Friday the football game had been moved from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m.
But many retailers weren't about to change their plans despite the storm. This is the busiest weekend of the year for the Sound Garden in Fells Point. The music store was open early Saturday and already had customers milling about its aisles before 10 a.m.
Manager Alex Ashkenes send customers an e-mail telling them the parking lots was plowed and Thames Street was clear. He encouraged shoppers to support local independent businesses.
Reached by phone, Ashkenes was optimistic about the day. He would remain open as long as the weather didn't get too treacherous.
"There are people walking about in Fells Point," he said. "I expect the other stores to open."
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