York Corp

T. Rowe Price Associates Inc.'s stock shot up 10 percent yesterday, apparently on speculation that there will be more acquisitions in the financial services industry.Shares of the Baltimore-based mutual fund company's stock soared $6.0625 to a 52-week high of $66.94.Steven Norwitz, a spokesman for Price, said there have been "no corporate announcements that the market might react to. We haven't had any announcements at all."Company executives have previously been adamant in saying that they intend to remain independent.

The Federal Reserve approved yesterday Bankers Trust New York Corp.'s planned $1.64 billion acquisition of Alex. Brown Inc., the last significant hurdle in the New York-based banking company's quest to expand into investment activities."

NEW YORK -- Former financier Martin Armstrong, who has spent six years in jail for defying a judge's order, pleaded guilty yesterday to federal charges that he conspired to defraud Japanese investors out of millions of dollars. Armstrong, the former money manager and founder of Princeton Economics International Ltd., faces up to five more years in prison after admitting that he lied to investors about losses incurred by his fund in commodities futures trades. "By falsely representing to investors that my trading performance was better than it actually was, what I was doing was wrong and improper," Armstrong, 57, told U.S. District Judge John Keenan in New York.

NationsBank Corp. said yesterday that it will buy Chicago Research and Trading Group Ltd., one of the world's largest options and government bond trading firms, for $225 million in cash.CRT performs securities risk-management services for its clients, trading in so-called "derivatives," or products derived from underlying financial instruments or commodities, such as stocks, bonds, currencies and oil. Some common derivatives include options, futures and interest-rate swaps."On our own we can provide some of the complex products that our corporate customers need," said NationsBank Chairman and Chief Executive OfficerHugh L. McColl.

Mary E. Gott, a secretary and human resources worker, died Wednesday of lung cancer at her Stewartstown, Pa., home. The former Hamilton resident was 51. Born Mary Ellen Anft in Baltimore and raised on Westfield Avenue in Hamilton, she was a 1973 Northern High School graduate. She then worked as a secretary in the president's office at the Community College of Baltimore's Liberty Heights campus. In 1981 she became secretary to The Sun's composing room superintendent, Hugh Meadowcroft. She maintained personnel records for the department, which had 200 employees, researched and prepared information presented at employee arbitration cases, assisted with planning and preparing the department's budget, and was the department representative for the company blood bank and the United Way fund drive.

WASHINGTON -- A federal judge continued yesterday to restrict Business Week's right to publish a story about sealed court documents, but simultaneously made those papers public.Thus, a major constitutional battle over the First Amendment, already running longer than many such battles in the past, took on a bizarre but still serious character and seemed sure to remain in the courts for at least several more days.The unusual turn of events in a pair of rulings by U.S. District Judge John Feikens left the magazine and its competitors free to write about a new development in a major corporate legal fight but kept Business Week at least technically restrained.

Penril DataComm reports lossPenril DataComm Networks Inc. said yesterday that delays in shipping some of its electronic products contributed to a net loss of $974,000 on sales of $15.4 million in its fiscal first quarter, which ended Oct. 31.The performance was down significantly from last year's first quarter, in which the company earned $507,000 on sales of $18.5 million.Chairman Henry Epstein said the Gaithersburg-based company would be restructuring over the next several weeks and take a charge in the second quarter.

Host Marriott Corp. rung up a 63 percent gain in earnings in the second quarter of 1997, thanks to the performance of its upscale hotels amid a continued nationwide demand for rooms and a lack of new construction, the company said yesterday.The Bethesda-based lodging owner's $174 million in earnings before interest expense, taxes and noncash charges -- a standard measure of financial viability for real estate owners -- dovetails with one of the biggest hotel booms of this century.Host Marriott's net income more than tripled in the quarter ended June 20 quarter to $26 million, or 13 cents per share.

NEW YORK -- Bankers Trust New York Corp. yesterday said first-quarter earnings rose 11 percent, as net income from investment banking and equity investments offset a loss in Asia.The bank said net income rose to $222 million, or $2.01 a diluted share, from $200 million, or $1.76, in the same period last year. The results beat analysts' expectations of $1.96, according to a survey by First Call Corp."They make enough money in their various activities to absorb the costs of Asia," said Jean Malo, a principal at Vaughan, Nelson, Scarborough & McCullough, which held 116,333 shares as of Dec. 31.Bankers Trust purchased investment bank Alex.

Computer program venture setCapital Cities-ABC Inc. will form a venture with Electronic Arts Inc. to produce computer programs for children, the first time a large TV network has aligned itself with a major software company.The venture, which has been rumored for several weeks, will develop games and educational software based on ABC-TV children's programs but may later be expanded, sources said yesterday.Representatives of the companies declined to comment before a news conference at Capital Cities-ABC's corporate headquarters today.