Business briefs for July 16, 2004

Friday, July 16, 2004 | 11:02 a.m.

IBM's numbers reassure

NEW YORK -- IBM, a bellwether of the corporate computing business, supplied a modest dose of steadying reassurance Thursday to a shaky technology sector.

The world's largest computer maker and technology services provider reported quarterly profit that surpassed Wall Street estimates.

The company reported a profit of nearly $1.99 billion, up 17 percent from $1.71 billion in the year-earlier quarter. It reported earnings per share of $1.16, or 4 cents higher than the consensus estimate of Wall Street analysts. In the second quarter of 2003, IBM earned 98 cents per share. Revenue rose 7 percent to $23.2 billion.

Ex-Tyco attorney acquitted

NEW YORK -- Tyco International's former general counsel, Mark A. Belnick, was acquitted Thursday on all charges that he stole millions of dollars from the company in the form of unauthorized bonuses and loans and that he failed to disclose the payments.

The decision by a jury in New York state Supreme Court is a serious setback for prosecutors in the Manhattan district attorney's office, whose efforts to convict two other former top Tyco executives ended in a messy mistrial in April. And it is the most prominent white-collar case spawned by recent corporate scandals that the government has lost outright.

WASHINGTON:

Consumer prices rose a modest 0.3 percent in June, half the size of the previous month's advance, the Labor Department reported today.