Business news briefs for April 5, 2004

Monday, April 5, 2004 | 11:05 a.m.

Department store giant sells drug chain

DALLAS -- J.C. Penney Co., the second-largest U.S. department store company, today said it's selling its struggling Eckerd chain to CVS Corp. and Jean Coutu Group for $4.53 billion to focus on boosting sales at its other stores and catalogs.

CVS will pay $2.15 billion for 1,260 stores in southern U.S. states and Eckerd's pharmacy benefits management program, the companies said. Jean Coutu will pay $2.38 billion for 1,539 stores in 13 eastern states.

Glitch causes overcharges

DENVER -- A computer hardware problem caused more than 800,000 credit and debit card transactions to be double- or triple-billed last week at Wal-Mart stores nationwide.

Staci Busby, a spokeswoman for First Data Corp., an electronic payments processor, said Sunday the excess charges on MasterCard and Visa accounts had been reversed.

For the record

TORONTO:

Nortel Networks Corp., North America's largest maker of telephone equipment, today said the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has opened a formal probe into the company's accounting. The SEC is investigating Nortel's restatement of financial results late last year and a March announcement that some of the figures might need to be revised again.

NEW YORK:

U.S. chief executive officers' confidence in the economy rose to the highest in more than 20 years, with business leaders saying current conditions have improved, a private survey by the New York-based Conference Board found.