Nation digest: Foreclosures up 60% over February 2007

NATION

Foreclosures up 60% over February 2007

LOS ANGELES — Nearly 60 percent more U.S. homes faced foreclosure in February than in the same month last year, with Nevada, California and Florida showing the highest foreclosure rates, a research firm said. A total of 223,651 homes across the nation received at least one notice from lenders last month related to overdue payments, up 59.8 percent from 139,922 a year earlier, according to Irvine, Calif.-based RealtyTrac Inc.

Retail sales drop by 0.6% in February

WASHINGTON — Consumers, battered by plunging home prices and a credit crunch, stayed away from the malls in February, pushing retail sales down by a larger-than-expected amount. It was another worrisome sign that the country could be falling into a recession. The Commerce Department reported Thursday that retail sales fell by 0.6 percent last month, far worse than the 0.2 percent increase that analysts had been expecting.

Molson to cut 390 jobs throughout world

DENVER — Molson Coors Brewing Co., one of the nation’s biggest beer makers, said Thursday it plans to eliminate up to 390 jobs, or about 4 percent of its global work force, as part of a cost-cutting drive and outsource the duties to the technology company Hewlett-Packard Co. The cuts will be divided about evenly among the company’s three operating divisions: Coors Brewing Co. in Golden, Colo., Coors Brewers Ltd. in England and Molson Inc. in Toronto, the company said. The cuts will be in human resources, information technology and finance. The company employs about 9.500 people worldwide.

Chrysler tells workers to take 2-week vacation

DETROIT — Chrysler LLC is telling employees worldwide to take a mandatory two-week vacation in July. Chrysler plans a corporate-wide shutdown the weeks of July 7 and July 14. Heilprin says some employees may be asked to stay on to work on special projects. The company’s operations in Ohio include a Jeep plant in Toledo. It’s common for automakers to shut down plants in July, but this also would affect salaried workers.

WORLD

Volkswagen sets goal of 8 million by 2011

WOLFSBURG, Germany — Volkswagen AG aims to sell 8 million cars a year by 2011 — almost 30 percent more than last year — and will introduce 20 additional models including vans, pickups and sport-utility vehicles in a bid to expand its market share in Asia, Europe and North America. Europe’s biggest automaker by sales is also looking at building a new plant in the United States that could produce between 100,000 and 150,000 cars per year.

Associated Press