Official: Wall Street bonuses down amid slide in profits

Official: Wall Street bonuses down amid slide in profits

ALBANY, N.Y.

Average Wall Street bonuses were down 9 percent last year to $146,200 as industry profits declined, New York’s comptroller reported Monday.

Industry-wide profits decreased by 10.5 percent, according to the annual estimate from state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli. The comptroller said revenues were weak, especially from trading and underwriting. Profits were at their lowest reported level since 2011.

“This was the third-consecutive year of lower profit,” DiNapoli told reporters Monday. “You do have a very volatile market.”

Fed vice chairman: Inflation ticking up

WASHINGTON

Federal Reserve Vice Chairman Stanley Fischer said Monday that inflation in the U.S. may be starting to tick up from too-low levels, a key condition for further interest-rate hikes.

“We may well at present be seeing the first stirrings of an increase in the inflation rate – something that we would like to happen,” he said in a speech in Washington.

However, another Fed official, Lael Brainard, expressed uncertainty about whether an improving job market would be enough to bolster inflation, given persistently low oil prices and a strong dollar. Inflation has “persistently underperformed” relative to the Fed’s target of annual price gains of 2 percent, she said in a separate speech Monday.

Verizon to pay $1.35M in FCC settlement

NEW YORK

Verizon will pay a $1.35 million fine over its “supercookie” that the government said followed phone customers on the Internet without their permission. Verizon also will have to get an explicit “yes” from customers for some kinds of tracking.

The supercookies landed their name because they were hard, or near-impossible, to block. Verizon uses them to deliver targeted ads to cellphone customers. The company wants to expand its advertising and media business and bought AOL for its digital ad technology in 2015.

The Federal Communications Commission said Monday that it found that Verizon began using the supercookies with consumers in December 2012 but didn’t disclose the program until October 2014. Verizon updated its privacy policy to disclose the trackers in March 2015 and gave people an option then to opt out.

Supreme Court rejects Apple appeal

WASHINGTON

The Supreme Court rejected an appeal from Apple Inc. Monday and left in place a ruling that the company conspired with publishers to raise electronic-book prices when it sought to challenge Amazon.com’s dominance of the market.

The justices’ order Monday lets stand an appeals court ruling that found Cupertino, Calif.-based Apple violated antitrust laws in 2010.

Apple wanted to raise prices to wrest some book sales away from Amazon, which controlled 90 percent of the market and sold most popular books online for $9.99. Amazon’s share of the market dropped to 60 percent.

Stock market posts meager gains

NEW YORK

Stocks wavered throughout the day but managed to eke out modest gains Monday as oil prices rose.

Investors bought drillers, refiners and other energy companies as the three-week rise in crude continued.

Wire reports