IN BRIEF

Work on Fontainebleau may not be restarting soon

Rumors of construction possibly restarting at Fontainebleau Las Vegas seem to be premature.

The buzz began Tuesday after some local media outlets began reporting that approximately $1.2 billion in construction permits were pulled for the dormant project.

However, a representative for Clark County said the permit pulls were actually six-month renewals for 47 permits covering different areas of the project.

Without the renewals, the project's owners would have to reapply for new permits, an expensive and time-consuming proposition, before the project could restart.

Steve Ross, secretary-treasurer of the Southern Nevada Building and Construction Trades Council, said Friday that none of the alliance's unions have been contacted about the project restarting.

The council represents 17 labor unions that had 3,000 of its members laid off in late April 2009 when the project was shut down. The previous owners filed for bankruptcy June 9, 2009.

Billionaire investor Carl Icahn acquired the unfinished 3,889-room hotel-casino in February with a $150 million bid in bankruptcy court.

Flooding forces Pinnacle to shutter St. Louis casino

The President Casino in downtown St. Louis, which had been scheduled to close on Tuesday, was shuttered five days early by Pinnacle Entertainment due to prolonged flooding along the Mississippi River.

Las Vegas-based Pinnacle announced in the spring it was closing the President and would return the casino's gaming license to Missouri regulators. About 13 companies have said they are interested in bidding for the available gaming license, which could eventually be transferred to another part of the state.

Pinnacle operates Lumiere Place in downtown St. Louis and opened the River City Casino in March in suburban St. Louis, rendering the President obsolete.

Permanent closure of the casino had been scheduled for 2 a.m. Tuesday. However, the casino's operations had been closed for a few days because of flooding along the river, which has now been projected to continue into next week.

The shutdown means 200 people are now out of work, and the city of St. Louis will lose about $2 million dollars in tax revenue.

LOS ANGELES

Drop in new-home orders hurt quarterly profits for KB Home

KB Home on Friday became the latest homebuilder to report a sharp drop in new-home orders in the three months ended in May as federal tax incentives aimed at spurring home sales expired.

The builder's orders fell 23 percent versus the same quarter last year. On Thursday, rival Lennar Corp. reported a 10 percent drop in orders, with the slide taking place entirely in the weeks after the tax credits expired on April 30.

The company said its net loss was $30.7 million, or 40 cents per share, for the three months ended May 31. That compares with a loss of $83.6 million, or $1.03 per share, a year earlier.

A year ago, the company recorded $49.5 million in asset impairment and land option contract abandonment charges. There were no such charges in the latest quarter.

Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters were expecting a smaller loss of 30 cents a share.

Revenue fell 2.7 percent to $374.1 million from $384.5 million.

The builder reported 2,244 net home orders, down from 2,910 a year earlier. Still, they rose 17 percent sequentially from the prior quarter.

KB Home shares fell $1.10, or 9 percent, Friday to close at $11.12 on the New York Stock Exchange.

TRENTON, N.J.

Drugmaker Merck & Co. will challenge loss in drug trial

Drugmaker Merck & Co. said it will challenge its first loss in a trial blaming its osteoporosis drug for destroying a patient's jawbone after a federal jury on Friday awarded $8 million to the Florida woman.

The U.S. District Court jury in New York awarded that amount in compensatory damages to Shirley Boles, 72, of Fort Walton, Fla., who alleged Merck's Fosamax destroyed her jawbone near her ears, causing serious pain and disability.

The three-week trial ended after nearly four hours of deliberations Friday by a jury of three men and four women. It was the second for Boles, a retired sheriff's deputy in the sex crimes unit in Oskaloosa County, Fla. Her first trial ended last September in a mistrial.

The jury concluded that Fosamax was "unreasonably dangerous due to defective design, and that its defective design was a legal cause of Mrs. Boles' injury."

WASHINGTON

Government gets order to halt $34 million Ponzi scheme

The government said Friday it obtained a court order to halt an alleged $34 million Ponzi scheme targeting federal employees and law enforcement agents nationwide with promises of safe investments in a nonexistent bond fund.

The Securities and Exchange Commission said the order issued Thursday by a federal judge in Miami also froze the assets of the estate of the late Kenneth Wayne McLeod, his consulting firm Federal Employee Benefits Group of Jacksonville, Fla., and an affiliated investment firm. The SEC alleged that McLeod and the firms defrauded an estimated 260 investors starting in 1988.

McLeod used their retirement savings to enrich himself and pay for lavish entertainment including yearly trips to the Super Bowl for himself and 40 friends, the SEC said in a civil complaint filed Thursday in federal court in Miami.

NEW YORK

Abercrombie & Fitch bringing back racy quarterly catalog

Preppy teen retailer Abercrombie & Fitch is reinstating its racy A&F Quarterly catalog after a seven-year hiatus.

The catalog, shot by fashion photographer Bruce Weber, is available for pre-order on Abercrombie's website for $10 and will be released July 17.

Abercrombie was among the teen retailers hit hardest when consumers cut spending in the recession and abandoned its relatively high-priced flannel shirts and jeans for products from lower-priced competitors such as Aeropostale Inc. and American Eagle Outfitters Inc.

The company updated its assortment, lowered prices and cut costs, and sby the first half of this year customers were returning. For the five months through the end of May, its revenue in stores open at least one year, a key measure of a retailer's fiscal health, rose 1 percent, while total revenue rose 13 percent to $885.4 million.

Abercrombie stopped publishing the quarterly in 2003 following complaints about its sexually suggestive photographs. But the company never gave a reason.