Obama signs transportation bill

Obama signs transportation bill

WASHINGTON

A five-year, $305 billion bill to address the nation’s aging and congested transportation systems was signed into law Friday by President Barack Obama, who said it will put Americans to work and provide states with the federal help they need to commit to long-term projects.

The bill, which was overwhelmingly approved by Congress a day earlier, provides a modest increase to highway and transit spending but falls short of the $400 billion over six years administration officials said is necessary to keep traffic congestion from worsening. Nor does it resolve how to pay for transportation programs in the long term.

Obama said he’ll continue to push for greater transportation spending to meet the nation’s infrastructure needs and create jobs.

“This bill is not perfect, but it is a common-sense compromise, and an important first step in the right direction,” Obama said in a statement.

OPEC keeps oil production at current high levels

VIENNA

OPEC nations decided Friday to keep producing oil at their current high levels, effectively acknowledging their inability to push up crude prices.

An attempt to nudge the cost of oil higher would have involved lowering output. Instead, the organization’s endorsement of present output, which is more than 1.5 million barrels a day above the formal ceiling of 30 million barrels, is likely to push the price of oil down further.

The ministers of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries appeared to have little choice. Major producing nations in the cartel were opposed to reducing output. Instead, OPEC is poised to produce more oil.

Iran, which once pumped about 4 million barrels a day and is now down to about half that, is preparing to come back fully on line once it sheds nuclear-related sanctions in a few months.

Chicken of the Sea, Bumble Bee call off canned-tuna merger

WASHINGTON

Chicken of the Sea and Bumble Bee have called off their proposed merger after the Obama administration told the companies it would hurt competition in the U.S. canned-tuna market.

The Justice Department announced Friday that the deal, announced a year ago between Thailand’s largest seafood company and Bumble Bee Foods of the U.S., was off. If Thai Union Group, owner of Chicken of the Sea, had bought Bumble Bee, it would have combined the second- and third-largest sellers of canned tuna in the U.S. in a market long dominated by three major brands.

The third major brand is StarKist Co., based in Pittsburgh, a subsidiary of Dongwon Industries of Seoul, South Korea. Bumble Bee, which is owned by the British investment firm Lion Capital LLP, is based in San Diego. Tri-Union Seafoods, the Thai Union subsidiary operating as Chicken of the Sea International, also is based in San Diego.

Associated Press