Word: settlements
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...hung up on the unique problems of tobacco bonds, which are state-issued debt backed by future payments of tobacco companies as part of a landmark 1998 liability settlement. States including California and New York have issued some $18 billion of these bonds to get their mitts on the tobacco loot now rather than wait to collect it in dribs and drabs over the next few decades. The bonds have always offered a higher yield than similarly rated munis--today, about 5.5% vs. 4.1%--because no taxing authority stands behind them, only a handful of private companies that...
...upshot: if tax-free income is what you savor, this is a great time to buy munis. Altria is just blowing smoke about bankruptcy; indeed, at the urging of a large number of states, Illinois has dramatically reduced Altria's appeal bond so that it can keep making settlement payments. Even in bankruptcy, the payments would probably continue as an operating expense. And even in the unlikely event that the tax on stock dividends is erased, there will be no massive flight from munis toward stocks. The typical muni investor values stability above...
...Western education, he's in no hurry to promote reforms that might threaten his regime's control. Like his father, Bashar is ready for a peace deal with Israel that wins back the Golan Heights, lost in the 1967 war, but he is holding out for a comprehensive settlement of all outstanding Arab grievances...
...Forty-Niners. You can still find remains of a few short-lived gold, silver and copper mines in the mountains, but the real fortunes in Death Valley were made with "white gold": borax. The first big operation, the Harmony Borax Works (1883-88), led to the settlement of Furnace Creek. Borates were scraped off yellow badlands in nearby Mustard Canyon, refined by Chinese laborers and pulled 165 miles to market in Mojave on the famous 20-mule-team wagons. Remnants of the original wagons, with their giant, 7-ft.-high wheels, are on display at Furnace Creek...
...allegations that, in the process of handing out Elf's money, the defendants broke the law in helping themselves to some of it. Le Floch-Prigent, who is now serving a 21/2 year sentence from a previous corruption trial, has conceded that Elf paid for his $5 million divorce settlement and bought him a $9.3 million apartment in the upscale 16th arrondissement of Paris as well as a country house; perks he sheepishly described as "the folly of grandeur." Verwaerde said Savimbi had approved his taking some of the Swiss account money as a "fee." Tarallo testified that...