Investment

The last man to take a horse to Belmont with a chance to snag the elusive final gem in the Triple Crown has some advice for Doug O'Neill. Stay true to the horse. "I think trainers going around asking other people what they should do, looking for how to handle it, that's stupid," Rick Dutrow, trainer of Big Brown in 2008, said in a phone interview Sunday. "It's got to be about your horse. Whatever anybody else did doesn't matter. You know your horse. " O'Neill, trainer of Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner I'll Have Another, has already disregarded common wisdom over the past three weeks.

The quiet, staggering problem at the center of the General Assembly's gasoline tax debate was this: Maryland does not have the money to maintain our transportation system ("Unfinished business," May 16). In the fervor, it was easy to miss the reason for the debate. The crisis began when we consumers, in response to the recession, turned to cars with better gas mileage, to carpooling, to transit - any means to decrease our own pain at the pump. The Transportation Trust Fund, already weakened from regular budget raiding, was further diminished as the main funding stream, the per-gallon tax, dwindled.

T. Rowe Price Group's stake in Facebook Inc. more than tripled in value as the social networking giant went public Friday. At the close of the market Friday, T. Rowe's investment in Facebook was valued at $695.8 million. The Baltimore-based mutual fund company invested $190.5 million in Facebook last spring. Shares of Facebook finished trading at $38.23 — just 23 cents above the initial public offering price set by the company and its underwriters. T. Rowe holds 18.2 million Facebook shares, which are spread across 80 mutual funds and accounts controlled by the investment company, according to Facebook's IPO registration statement filed earlier this year.

The reports that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention cut its threshold for lead poisoning from 10 micrograms per deciliter to 5 micrograms were something of a simplification. What the CDC said, after years of study and discussion, was that no level of lead exposure for children is safe. The 5-microgram level was set somewhat arbitrarily as the point at which doctors and public health officials would recommend parents take action to reduce their children's risk, but there is ample evidence to show that levels of 3 or 4 micrograms - and perhaps even lower - are associated with learning and attention deficit disorders later in life.

In his State of the Union Address, President Obama barely touched on the country's soon-to-be $16 trillion national debt, massive joblessness, entitlement insolvency, economy-crippling government regulations and the other compelling issues ("Obama targets economy, taxes in address," Jan. 25). Sounding like an Occupy Wall Street interviewee, he once again attributed virtually all of the country's ills to the supposed failure of "millionaires and billionaires" to pay their "fair share.

Financial investment for clients isn't the only kind of investment being done at T. Rowe Price, which employs more than 3,600 associates at its downtown Baltimore headquarters and at a facility in Owings Mills. The public company, founded in 1937, invests in its workers, too, providing a workplace culture that encourages collaboration to produce the best results for clients, employees say. "It's not about pay or benefits or work conditions. It's about our values," said Gretchen Park, head of global human resources.

I've been doing a lot of research into investments lately. My conclusion has been that stocks are too risky because of electronic trading, bonds are too risky because politicians are incompetent, and traditional banks have next to zero return on investment. I had heard of peer-to-peer lending in the past, but discovered today that it is quickly becoming a legitimate investment option. Returns start at 5 percent and grow linearly as risk increases. It operates essentially the way banks are supposed to: borrow at X percent, lend at Y percent and pocket the difference for arranging the transaction.

If Maryland's 6th District election was a poker match, Democrat Milad Pooran would be all in. The Jefferson physician, whose campaign for the Democratic nomination has largely operated in the shadow of two better-known opponents, announced today he will put $200,000 of his own money into his campaign -- a significant investment of his personal savings, aides said. The unusual decision comes after a poll the campaign conducted showed nearly 40 percent of voters were still undecided in a race that has so far been dominated by state Sen. Rob Garagiola and businessman John Delaney. Pooran, 35, has cast himself as a progressive alternative to Garagiola and Delaney.

Wall Street is littered with stocks that went public years ago, became big hits, and then fell apart when the company's strategy didn't pan out.Such stocks become Wall Street orphans.Analysts stop following them. Institutional investors stop owning them. Brokers stop pushing them. Many wind up wallowing at low levels for years until they go out of business, are acquired, or rediscovered.If small-cap stocks become the rage of the '90s, as many analysts predict, the orphans could provide the fury, and Paul Stephens of San Francisco-based Robertson Stephens & Co. doesn't want to miss the excitement.

After a seven-year delay, Randallstown residents cheered Monday over an announcement that a Walmart will open on Liberty Road next year. Officials and residents have long hoped that the store — a planned $9 million, 160,000-square-foot supercenter with groceries and a pharmacy — would revitalize the aging commercial corridor, encouraging other national retailers and restaurants to set up shop in the affluent, largely black community....

T. Rowe Price Group's stake in Facebook Inc. more than tripled in value as the social networking giant went public Friday. At the close of the market Friday, T. Rowe's investment in Facebook was valued at $695.8 million. The Baltimore-based mutual fund company invested $190.5 million in Facebook last spring. Shares of Facebook finished trading at $38.23 — just 23 cents above the initial public offering price set by the company and its underwriters. T. Rowe holds 18.2 million Facebook shares, which are spread across 80 mutual funds and accounts controlled by the investment company, according to Facebook's IPO registration statement filed earlier this year.

Standing before some 30 activists and Union Square neighbors Saturday in a neon orange T-shirt with the words "I am Baltimore," 16-year-old Antonio Ellis recited a gritty poem about how the city appears through his eyes. "Born and raised in the city, where youth are always misunderstood. / Being judged based on skin color or because they're from the 'hood," the Reginald F. Lewis High School sophomore said in a lyrical rhythm. "Living in the city, where there is little chance to succeed.

Corporate Office Properties Trust said Monday that it had sold two office buildings and land in Rockville for about $48.7 million, part of the Columbia-based real estate investment trust's strategy of selling off non-core assets. COPT, which develops, owns and manages office buildings primarily for government agencies and contractors in the defense information sector, has sold $116.9 million worth of properties and land since the beginning of the year. Since last April, the company has been selling suburban office buildings to focus on high-security offices for defense tenants.

A Baltimore home builder pleaded guilty Thursday in connection with a construction investment scheme that defrauded victims of more than $14 million, the Maryland U.S. attorney's office said. Brian McCloskey, 44, spent at least two years — from 2009 to 2011 — targeting people with money to invest in construction projects or who needed financing for their own projects, including a hotel in Bowie. He told the investors to put "large sums of money" in an escrow bank account to prove liquidity for purposes of getting financing, and that they would receive a high rate of return for their efforts, according to his plea agreement.

Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blakesaid Wednesday that the city would not increase spending on the Baltimore Grand Prix to ensure the Labor Day weekend race comes to fruition. "I'm hopeful that with Indy's involvement that it will happen," Rawlings-Blake said of the three-day racing festival. City officials and Indycar executives have been trying for weeks to hash out a deal to continue the race.  Downforce Racing, the team city leaders picked to organize this year's race, is divided by internal strife and has not sold tickets or marketed the event.  City officials chose Downforce following the financial collapse of the group that put together the inaugural race last year.

Two floors remain to be leased at Towson City Center, the 12-story building on York Road near the Towson roundabout that is being revived from its previous life as Towson's Investment Building. Leasing firm Cassidy Turley said Wednesday that only the fifth and sixth floors of the 157,712-square-foot building remained unleased. Towson City Center is slated to open in July. The largest single tenant for the building will be Towson University, which has leased four floors, totaling nearly 58,000 square feet of space.

Forstmann Little & Co. has signed an initial agreement to invest $350 million for a one-third interest in Whittle Communications, the media company that was founded by Christopher Whittle.The investment would reduce the stakes in Whittle now held by Time Warner Inc., Associated Newspapers of London, Whittle and 60 Whittle executives.Forstmann Little, an investment firm that has historically specialized in leveraged buyouts while avoiding the "junk bonds" that characterized many of those deals in the 1980s, is expected to put up the $350 million in subordinated financing, convertible at a future date into a one-third equity stake.

SAVING THE city or creating a more prosperous state doesn't concern the pension boards of Baltimore City and the state of Maryland. For them, it appears, the less spent locally the better. That's why Mayor Martin O'Malley exploded at a recent Board of Estimates meeting over what he perceives as the trustees' anti-city attitude. The city's two pension boards are hurting, not helping, Baltimore. The mayor wasn't the first government leader to complain about the elitist, anti-local investment strategy of pension boards.

Baltimore County no longer plans to sue Merrill Lynch over a $21 million investment made in 2007, officials said Tuesday. County Executive Kevin Kamenetz had proposed a contract with two outside law firms to pursue a potential lawsuit, and County Council members were set to discuss the contract at a meeting Tuesday. The firms are Scott, Douglass & McConnico LLP, which is based in Austin, Texas, and Themis PLLC, which has offices in Washington, D.C., and Chevy Chase. But Kamenetz chief of staff Don Mohler said the outside attorneys told the county late last week that they were no longer interested.

Businesses in China and India, the emerging markets that Gov. Martin O'Malley has been trawling for trade relationships, are beginning to bite. This month, the governor announced the opening of a Chinese bank in Baltimore and conducted a forum for Indian business leaders, priming them to open U.S. subsidiaries in the state. The events could be a turning point for investment in Maryland from these countries. "Europe is struggling and global companies want to go to stable environments," said Nancy McLernon, president and CEO of the Organization for International Investment, a Washington-based nonprofit business association for U.S. subsidiaries of foreign companies.