Paul Cos

The St. Paul Cos. Inc. said yesterday that its current round of job cuts will result in the firings of 1,250 employees worldwide, including 200 at the insurer's Mount Washington and Owings Mills offices.The notices went out to employees starting last week, and will be sent throughout this week. The fired workers will generally stay on for 60 days after receiving notice, and receive severance packages and placement assistance.The terminations, which cut across several departments, account for about 9 percent of the Minnesota company's work force.

In its heyday, USF&G Corp. was one of Baltimore's highest-profile companies - an insurer with an Inner Harbor high-rise to hold its thousands of local employees. Reorganized after tough times, its city staff had dropped to 2,800 by the time The St. Paul Cos. bought it six years ago. Now, just 700 work here - and further cuts loom. Newly merged, The St. Paul Travelers Cos. said this week it is planning to save $300 million by eliminating jobs, consolidating offices and trimming other expenses.

ST. PAUL, Minn. - St. Paul Cos., the fourth-largest U.S. business insurer, paid Chief Executive Officer Jay S. Fishman $2.96 million in 2002 as the company returned to profitability. Fishman, 50, was paid $1 million in salary, $1.13 million in bonus, $416,605 in restricted stock, stock options worth $188,451 on their grant date, and $226,342 in other compensation, according to a company filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. St. Paul, which acquired Baltimore based USF&G Corp.

In Baltimore City Boy, 8 months, found on street with cord around his neck An 8-month-old boy was found on a West Baltimore street with a cord wrapped around his neck and a rat-tailed comb lodged in his throat early yesterday -- an incident that is being investigating as child abuse, city police said. The infant, Shelton Miller, was in serious condition and breathing with the help of a ventilator at University of Maryland Medical Center's pediatric intensive care unit, police said. At 6:07 a.m., police received a call reporting that a baby had been abandoned in the 1400 block of Mountmor Court.

Nine top USF&G Corp. executives will take senior positions with the Minnesota-based company that is acquiring the Baltimore insurer, the companies said yesterday."

In its heyday, USF&G Corp. was one of Baltimore's highest-profile companies - an insurer with an Inner Harbor high-rise to hold its thousands of local employees. Reorganized after tough times, its city staff had dropped to 2,800 by the time The St. Paul Cos. bought it six years ago. Now, just 700 work here - and further cuts loom. Newly merged, The St. Paul Travelers Cos. said this week it is planning to save $300 million by eliminating jobs, consolidating offices and trimming other expenses.

St. Paul Cos., the Minnesota property and casualty insurer that acquired USF&G, announced yesterday that it might cut 500 to 600 more jobs by the end of next year, a move that could include some job losses in Baltimore.The reductions were billed as a way to offset the company's falling profits in its commercial insurance business, and would be in addition to 2,000 job cuts already announced when St. Paul Cos. bought USF&G for $3.5 billion in April.Before it was acquired, USF&G employed about 2,500 people at its Mount Washington complex.

Shares of St. Paul Cos. fell more than $1 yesterday, one day after the insurance company announced that it had reached a $1 billion settlement related to asbestos claims. The company's shares had dropped earlier after a Securities and Exchange Commission filing last month in which it said the results of the asbestos litigation could be "material to our results of operations." Since that disclosure May 15, the stock has fallen more than $6, or 14 percent. Shares closed yesterday at $40.56, down $1.06, or 2.5 percent.

ST. PAUL, Minn. -- St. Paul Cos., one of the largest U.S. commercial insurers, said yesterday that first-quarter earnings fell 6.3 percent as property and casualty premium income declined.Operating profit, which excluded gains on investments and a charge, fell to $152.5 million, or 62 cents a share, from $162.8 million, or 64 cents, a year ago. The result was 1 cent shy of the average analyst forecast in a First Call Corp. poll.Premiums net of reinsurance dropped 5 percent to $1.57 billion and overall revenue at the St. Paul, Minnesota, company fell 3.4 percent to $2.24 billion.

In a 20-minute special shareholders meeting -- punctuated by a near-apology from Chairman Norman P. Blake Jr. -- USF&G stockholders yesterday overwhelmingly voted to approve the $3.5 billion takeover of their company by St. Paul Cos. of St. Paul, Minn.St. Paul shareholders, at a separate meeting later in the day, voted to issue new stock to pay for the transaction, which the firms hope to have completed by the end of this month.After making a brief speech to shareholders at USF&G's Mount Washington headquarters, Blake said he'd had a tough time remaining emotionless during the meeting and sounded almost apologetic about the sale.

ST. PAUL, Minn. - St. Paul Cos., the fourth-largest U.S. business insurer, paid Chief Executive Officer Jay S. Fishman $2.96 million in 2002 as the company returned to profitability. Fishman, 50, was paid $1 million in salary, $1.13 million in bonus, $416,605 in restricted stock, stock options worth $188,451 on their grant date, and $226,342 in other compensation, according to a company filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. St. Paul, which acquired Baltimore based USF&G Corp.

In a major expansion plan, the Johns Hopkins University has signed a letter of intent to buy the sprawling St. Paul Cos. campus that straddles the city-county line in Mount Washington. Already a major property owner and the city's largest private employer with 35,000 people, Hopkins expects to keep growing. Assuming the deal is completed, Hopkins plans eventually to use just under half of the space in five major buildings on the 68-acre campus for administrative offices for the school and the hospital, a Hopkins official said yesterday.

Half of the St. Paul Co.'s sprawling, tree-lined Mount Washington campus, split by the northern city-county border, could have a new owner by early next year. But prospects for the other half are not as clear. The insurance company, saying it no longer needed all the space for its 700 employees, put the entire 68-acre site up for sale in September. Marketing the property as two parcels, St. Paul wants $34 million for the northern part, which sits in Baltimore County, according to area real estate brokers.

Shares of St. Paul Cos. fell more than $1 yesterday, one day after the insurance company announced that it had reached a $1 billion settlement related to asbestos claims. The company's shares had dropped earlier after a Securities and Exchange Commission filing last month in which it said the results of the asbestos litigation could be "material to our results of operations." Since that disclosure May 15, the stock has fallen more than $6, or 14 percent. Shares closed yesterday at $40.56, down $1.06, or 2.5 percent.

The St. Paul Cos. said yesterday that it plans to lay off 50 workers from its Baltimore offices as part of a plan to cut costs and get out of unprofitable businesses, such as malpractice insurance. A considerable number of the job losses in Baltimore will be security jobs, which the company plans to outsource, said spokesman Patrick Hirigoyen. The fourth-largest U.S. business insurer is cutting 1,150 jobs company-wide, more than the 750 it had initially announced last year. Most of the cuts will come from overseas, where the St. Paul, Minn.

Old Mutual PLC, a big financial services company in England, said yesterday that it completed the acquisition of Baltimore's Fidelity & Guaranty Life Insurance Co. for $635 million in cash and stock. The London-based Old Mutual, which bought F&G Life from the St. Paul Cos. of Minnesota, received approval from regulators in Maryland and New York this week, said Guy Barker, chief executive of Old Mutual's U.S. life insurance operations. "I think it is going to work out for us all around," Barker said.

St. Paul Cos., the Minnesota insurer that bought USF&G Corp., might look to expand in Baltimore if plans to acquire a property in its hometown fail, a spokeswoman said.Although the company has no immediate expansion plans, it expects the number of employees to grow over the next several years, which could force it to build a new headquarters office.One option is to erect a building in St. Paul across the street from its current office tower, which houses the majority of its 3,300 employees who work downtown.

When Maryland's private colleges went knocking on the door of St. Paul Cos. for a donation this year, the Minnesota-based company came up with an idea that would help not only college students but city schoolchildren as well.St. Paul and two other companies with offices in Baltimore, BT Alex. Brown Inc. and First Union, will announce today a commitment to underwrite at least nine scholarships and summer stipends for students who are interested in teaching in Baltimore's public schools.With city schools on a desperate search for teachers this year, the scholarship is one way for them to attract some of the state's top college students to teaching careers in a school system with the greatest need.

ST. PAUL, Minn. - St. Paul Cos. Inc. said yesterday that its second-quarter profit will fall by 35-40 cents because of storm and medical malpractice losses. The No. 4 U.S. business insurer said losses from Tropical Storm Allison, which hit Texas in June, are expected to be $50 million, or 14 cents a share. The company's total storm losses, which include losses stemming from storms in 16 states from Texas to Pennsylvania, would be $70 million, or 20 cents a share. The company said worse-than-expected claims at its medical malpractice liability division also will crimp second-quarter earnings as it added $100 million, or 29 cents a share, in pretax reserves.

The Baltimore region must reach out to younger people who are the future of the work force, an official involved with a marketing study commissioned by the Greater Baltimore Alliance said yesterday at the group's annual meeting. In a decade, those who are now 15 to 34 are going to be the key group in the work force - and Baltimore will have a deficit, said John A. MacColl, executive vice president and general counsel for the St. Paul Cos. Inc., who also serves on the GBA's board of directors.