BUSINESS BRIEFS
A&B's Doane, Dods gain titles
Advertiser Staff and News Services
The board of directors of Alexander & Baldwin Inc. has appointed W. Allen Doane to be chairman of the board upon the retirement in April of chairman Charles M. Stockholm.
Doane will remain A&B's president and CEO. Additionally, board member Walter Dods was appointed lead independent director, also effective in April.
Doane was named president and CEO of A&B in October 1998. He joined the company in 1991 as executive vice president and chief operating officer of A&B-Hawaii, Inc.
Dods is chairman of BancWest Corp. and one of its main subsidiaries, First Hawaiian Bank. He has served on A&B's board of directors since 1989 and, in 2004, retired as CEO of BancWest and First Hawaiian Bank.
A&B BUYS $21M UTAH PROPERTY
A&B Properties Inc. and related companies have purchased for $21.4 million the two-building Ninigret Office Park near Salt Lake City.
The two buildings have a total of 185,000 square feet of leasable space in the 175-acre Ninigret Business Park which is 10 miles west of downtown Salt Lake City. A&B Properties is a subsidiary of Alexander & Baldwin Inc.
CHEVRON LOGS RECORD PROFITS
NEW YORK — Despite steep hurricane-related costs, oil giant Chevron Corp.'s profit jumped to a record $4.1 billion in the fourth quarter, boosted mostly by the same high oil, natural gas and gasoline prices that have stretched family budgets and enraged politicians over the past year.
Chevron's quarterly earnings were up 20 percent compared with a year-ago profit of $3.4 billion. However, the per-share results of $1.86, up from $1.63 a share in the fourth quarter of 2004, were 3 cents below analyst expectations, according to a survey by Thomson Financial.
HALLIBURTON TO SELL STOCK IN IPO
DALLAS — Halliburton Co. said yesterday it plans to sell a minority stake in its engineering and construction unit KBR through an initial public offering. KBR has generated controversy over how it has become the largest U.S. contractor in Iraq.
Halliburton shares rose 5 percent, a jump analysts attribute directly to the IPO announcement. Halliburton, whose chief executive was Vice President Dick Cheney from 1995 to 2000, has been criticized since the Iraq war began for multibillion-dollar government contracts. Halliburton is an oilfield services company based in Houston.
ASIA CARMAKERS CONTINUE TO GAIN
DETROIT — Asian automakers will gain more U.S. market share this month despite General Motors Corp.'s decision to drop prices on most vehicles, analysts predicted yesterday.
It's a familiar pattern, and one that has driven U.S. automakers to declining profits, restructurings that will cost GM and Ford at least 64,000 jobs in the next six years, and to the threat of Japan's Toyota toppling GM as the world's largest automaker. GM, Ford and the Chrysler Group's U.S. market share has declined steadily over the past 10 years.
