General Electric

FAIRFIELD, Conn. -- General Electric Co. said yesterday that it plans to split its stock 2-for-1, increase its dividend and buy back more shares because it's churning out record amounts of cash.The plans again reward investors who have held shares during the 15 years that Chairman and Chief Executive Jack Welch spent building General Electric's basket of businesses, which range from light bulbs to loans to jet engines.GE has almost reached Welch's long-stated goal of being No. 1 in everything it does.

General Electric is planning to move its 115 year old X-ray division from Waukesha, Wis., to Bejing. In addition to moving this headquarters, the company will invest $2 billion in China, train more than 65 engineers and create six research centers. Remember this is the same GE that made $5.1 billion in the United States last year but paid no taxes. President Obama appointed GE chairman Jeffrey Immelt to head his commission on job creation in the United States. But it appears that President Obama forgot to tell him in which country he was supposed to be creating jobs for. If this doesn't point out the total lack of leadership of this president, I don't know what does.

STAMFORD, Conn. -- General Electric Co.'s financial services unit said it will buy First Colony Corp. for $1.8 billion as it expands into insurance and retirement planning.General Electric Capital Corp. will pay $36.15 a share for Lynchburg, Va.-based First Colony, a life insurer that sells annuities, term insurance and structured settlements.The acquisition will add $11 billion of assets to GE Capital's insurance and savings businesses, bringing the assets at GE Capital to $185 billion.GE Capital is trying to offer more retirement-related financial services and advice.

The Associated Press is apologizing after running a fake story this morning that claimed General Electric was giving millions of dollars to the federal government to make up for its failure to pay taxes last year.  "The AP did not follow its own standards in this case for verifying the authenticity of a news release," said AP Business Editor Hal Ritter . The AP fell victim to a prank, when the organization received a fake press release...

Over the past couple of weeks, many commentators have been giving General Electric a hard time for not paying any federal taxes -- when other companies with similar earnings have been paying 35 percent. The company also laid off 18,000 workers while earning billions in profits.  Over the weekend, U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) named the company to his list of top 10 worst tax offenders.  "Over the past five years, while General Electric made $26 billion in profits in the United States, it received a $4.1 billion refund from the IRS," Sanders' staff wrote in a news release.  Click here to see Sanders' list of corporate tax offenders.

General Electric is planning to move its 115 year old X-ray division from Waukesha, Wis., to Bejing. In addition to moving this headquarters, the company will invest $2 billion in China, train more than 65 engineers and create six research centers. Remember this is the same GE that made $5.1 billion in the United States last year but paid no taxes. President Obama appointed GE chairman Jeffrey Immelt to head his commission on job creation in the United States. But it appears that President Obama forgot to tell him in which country he was supposed to be creating jobs for. If this doesn't point out the total lack of leadership of this president, I don't know what does.

AlliedSignal wins GE contractAlliedSignal Inc. said yesterday its Torrance, Calif.-based aerospace division received a 10-year contract worth an estimated $280 million to supply General Electric Co. with jet engine parts.The agreement calls for AlliedSignal Aerospace to manufacture the hydromechanical control for General Electric's new CFM56-7 turbofan engine, which will power the next generation of Boeing Co.'s 737 passenger aircraft.

A decision by European regulators yesterday to derail a merger between General Electric Co. and Honeywell International Inc. may revive a plan to build housing and offices on a toxic waste site in Baltimore's Inner Harbor. Honeywell, which owns the land, had agreed to explore a $300 million project proposed by local developers. The site near Caroline Street contains buried waste from a former AlliedSignal Corp. chromium ore plant. At 27 acres, it is the harbor front's largest undeveloped parcel.

American Express Co. Shares declined 53 cents to finish at $44.83. A unit of General Electric Co. is selling its corporate payment services division to the credit card issuer, which is trying to increase its payments business.

Conseco Inc., an upstart life insurer, challenged General Electric Co. to a bidding war for Kemper Corp. yesterday, but GE decided to retreat from the field.Conseco offered yesterday morning to buy Kemper for $67 a share in cash and stock, or about $3.2 billion, topping General Electric's all-cash offer of $60 a share. By mid-afternoon, General Electric had withdrawn its bid, giving no reason for the move.General Electric has been frustrated in its efforts to acquire Kemper, a mutual fund and insurance company, since it started the bidding in March at $55 a share.

Over the past couple of weeks, many commentators have been giving General Electric a hard time for not paying any federal taxes -- when other companies with similar earnings have been paying 35 percent. The company also laid off 18,000 workers while earning billions in profits.  Over the weekend, U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) named the company to his list of top 10 worst tax offenders.  "Over the past five years, while General Electric made $26 billion in profits in the United States, it received a $4.1 billion refund from the IRS," Sanders' staff wrote in a news release.  Click here to see Sanders' list of corporate tax offenders.

By now, you've probably heard about how General Electric didn't pay taxes on more than $20 million in profits over the past two years. GE has received a lot of criticism over this little indiscretion.  But fear not, our rich friends. We're here to help.  We present to you, free of charge of course  ...  The top 10 ways General Electric can improve its image  10. Use the money it didn't pay in taxes to save Madonna's school   9. Use the money it didn't pay in taxes to make the "Jersey Shore" stop 8. Free a reporter from Joe Biden's closet  7. Use the money it didn't pay in taxes for a personalized advertising campaign at the homes of the New Black Panthers reminding them daily of their irrelevancy    6. Use the money it didn't pay in taxes to make Donald Trump stop   5. Join New York Mayor Bloomburg in a Spiderman extravaganza   4. Use the money it didn't pay in taxes to author a book of more convincing excuses for Newt Gingrich 3. Use the money it didn't pay it taxes to buy Bill Maher some class   2. Use the money it didn't pay it taxes to buy CBS better ratings  1. Start paying some damn taxes 

Dear General Electric, Last year, you earned $14.2 billion in profits and I earned, well, considerably less than that. The year before that, you earned $10.3 billion in profits and, again, I earned much, much less. But somehow, each of those years, I still paid more in federal taxes than you did, because you paid nothing . Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying you should have to pay more than me. After all, I do enjoy such luxuries as owning a rusty old car and shopping at the sales rack at JC Penney.

American Express Co. Shares declined 53 cents to finish at $44.83. A unit of General Electric Co. is selling its corporate payment services division to the credit card issuer, which is trying to increase its payments business.

EVENDALE, Ohio - General Electric Co.'s jet-engine unit will cut 1,000 jobs this year and might pare as many as 1,800 next year because commercial air travel is taking longer to recover than GE had expected. The cuts at the world's biggest maker of aircraft engines will include salaried and hourly workers, and will be made through early retirements, voluntary layoffs and firings, spokesman Rick Kennedy said yesterday. GE Aircraft Engines has about 26,600 employees worldwide. The commercial airline industry isn't likely to begin rebounding until 2005, David Calhoun, chief executive of GE Aircraft Engines, said during a Webcast to employees Tuesday, according to a transcript.

FAIRFIELD, Conn. - General Electric Co. agreed yesterday to buy Deutsche Bank AG's U.S. leasing unit for about $2.9 billion in cash and assumed debt, its second takeover of a European-owned financing business this month. Deutsche Financial Services provides financing of office equipment, industrial machines and recreational vehicles for more than 1,000 manufacturers and about 14,000 companies. It has 1,200 workers and receivables of $2.7 billion, it said in a statement. GE Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey Immelt has been expanding in Europe.

Scarcely a week after it filed a lawsuit accusing General Electric Co. of "systematically and aggressively" hiring employees privy to trade secrets, Dow Chemical Co. said yesterday that the two companies had reached an "amicable resolution" of the matter.Details of the settlement were not disclosed, but both Dow and General Electric said no money was involved.In a joint statement, Dow Executive Vice President Anthony J. Carbone and GE Plastics President Gary L. Rogers said the dispute was resolved after conversations between them and the exchange of information between the companies.

For proof of the real estate maxim that location is everything, see the success of the former General Electric industrial park in Columbia.When the facility opened some 25 years ago, Columbia was envisioned as a hub of manufacturing. But blue collars did not become Jim Rouse's planned city. It was white collars all the way, as a large and prosperous middle class grew in Howard County. The draw? Howard is an attractive suburban jurisdiction, to be sure, but perhaps most significantly, it also offers access to the many professional and cultural opportunities in the Baltimore-Washington corridor.

In the Region AAI parent sells rest of its transportation equipment business United Industrial Corp., the parent of Hunt Valley defense contractor AAI Corp., has sold the last remnants of its transportation-overhaul business to Alstom Transportation Inc. for about $19.2 million. United Industrial, rumored to be for sale, has long tried to shed its underperforming transportation equipment business, possibly to make it a more attractive takeover candidate. The contracts were with New Jersey Transit Corp.

FAIRFIELD, Conn. - For retired General Electric Co. Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Jack Welch, like many others who once led large U.S. companies, these are the golden years. Welch gets a $9 million annual pension. For any day when he offers General Electric advice, he earns an additional $17,000. He was able to build his nest egg by putting part of his salary into an account on which the world's largest company by market value guaranteed 10 percent annual interest. Big-league CEOs often award themselves lifetime benefits that would be the envy of most Americans.