Business Digest

REGION

First Niles Financial declares dividend

NILES — First Niles Financial declared a dividend of 12 cents a share on common stock and 13 cents a share on preferred Class A stock. The dividends will be paid Dec. 18 to shareholders of record on Dec. 4. First Niles is the holding company for Home Federal Savings and Loan Association of Niles.

For Postal Service, year resulted in loss of $3.8B

WASHINGTON — The Postal Service reported a loss of $3.8 billion last year, despite a reduction of 40,000 full-time positions and other cost-cutting measures.

The loss was $1 billion more than the year before, despite job cuts and other efforts designed to save billions of dollars, postal officials said Monday.

The post office has been struggling to cope with a decline in mail volume caused by the shift to the Internet as well as the recession that resulted in a drop in advertising and other mail. Total mail volume was 177.1 billion pieces, compared with 202.7 billion pieces in 2008, a decline of almost 13 percent.

Vindicator staff/wire reports