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Brown & Brown Inc. acquired the assets of Synergy Benefits Inc., an employee benefits firm in the greater Washington, D.C. metropolitan area

The purchase price was not disclosed.

Synergy Benefits has revenue of about $1.2 million, a statement said. Bernard Dombrowski and Robert Hayward, principals of Synergy, and their staff will join Brown & Brown Insurance Agency of Virginia’s existing office in Manassas, Va.

Brown & Brown (NYSE: BRO), headquartered in Tampa and in Daytona Beach, offers a broad range of insurance and reinsurance products.

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San Antonio Federal Credit Union has been awarded an A+ rating by the Better Business Bureau.

To be rated and accredited by the BBB, a business must adhere to a comprehensive set of policies, procedures and best practices representing trustworthiness in the marketplace. The standards call for building trust, embodying integrity, advertising honestly and telling the truth, being transparent, honoring promises, being responsive and safeguarding privacy.

This marks the 14th year that SACU has been accredited by the BBB serving Central, Coastal and Southwest Texas.

“Accreditation through BBB is another way to measure our commitment to building trust with our members,” says Sharon Spring, SACU director of branches and member services. “Our employees are committed to being trusted advisors to our members and strive to maintain high ethical standards of conduct and member satisfaction.”

SACU is a $2.8 billion credit union with 19 locations in San Antonio and one in Houston. The credit union provides a full range of products and services through competitive yields on savings, lower loan rates, and reasonably priced financial services.

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Vacancies at Kansas City-area shopping centers stayed above 12 percent in the second quarter, according to the Orange Report, a quarterly report issued by Lane4 Property Group Inc.

The average vacancy rate for metropolitan-area shopping centers during the second quarter was 12.1 percent, just below the 12.2 percent vacancy rate recorded in the first quarter.

During the second quarter last year, the vacancy rate was 11.9 percent.

The reasons behind the steadying vacancy rates are twofold, said Britt Crum-Cano, director of research for Kansas City-based Lane4. During the recession, the weaker retailers went away, leaving the stronger retailers to survive.

Additionally, landlords now seem more willing to negotiate and work with their current tenants so as not to lose them.

“I think we have a lot of untraditional types of negotiations going on,” Crum-Cano said. “The landlords are working one-on-one with tenants, especially if they are having some financial difficulties.”

The report also showed that the average lease rate for shopping centers dropped from $13.23 a foot in the first quarter to $12.99 in the second quarter. But this year’s second-quarter figures were 1.5 percent higher than the $12.80 recorded in the second quarter of last year.

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Goldman Sachs’ legal troubles just keep piling up — and it’s becoming a bigger headache for the investment bank and its shareholders.

Shares of Goldman Sachs sat out Thursday’s market rally. The stock tumbled nearly 3% in mid-afternoon trading and hit a new 52-week low after reports surfaced late Wednesday that the Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating a mortgage investment Goldman bundled and sold in 2006 called Hudson Mezzanine.

The SEC is already investigating possible fraud involved with an investment Goldman created called Abacus. A spokesman for the SEC declined to comment on whether the agency was indeed conducting an investigation into Hudson Mezzanine.

The reports follow news that Wall Street’s top firm was hit with a lawsuit from Basis Capital, an Australian hedge fund that invested in Timberwolf, another mortgage-backed security that Goldman sold in 2007. Basis is seeking more than $1 billion in damages in its civil suit.

A representative from Goldman Sachs (GS, Fortune 500) declined comment on the reported government investigation, but issued a sharp rebuke to the Timberwolf suit, calling it "a misguided attempt by Basis…to shift its investment losses to Goldman Sachs."

The latest developments are another setback for the once-impervious investment bank. A number of shareholder suits have been filed against Goldman in recent months. There have also been reports it is facing a criminal investigation by federal prosecutors.

At the center of it all however, is the SEC’s civil suit against Goldman, in which it charged the firm with defrauding clients on the sale of Abacus, a collateralized debt obligation, or CDO.

So far, there have been few signs of progress on the case. But that may soon be changing.

According to documents filed with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, Goldman currently has until June 22 to file a formal response to the SEC’s suit.

Experts suggest that Goldman will most likely call the government’s bluff and demand it drop the case as opposed to reaching a settlement by the deadline.

Such a move could help Goldman save face after it has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing. It would also potentially give the firm more insight into the SEC’s case as well as additional time to negotiate a possible settlement.

The spokesmen for the SEC and Goldman Sachs declined to comment on the status of the Abacus case.

But legal observers are confident that neither party has the stomach for an ugly courtroom battle cash till payday advance. Some have suggested the SEC does not want to risk an embarrassing courtroom loss given how anxious it has been to shore up its reputation in the wake of the Bernard Madoff Ponzi scheme.

Goldman, on the other hand, doesn’t want to tangle with one of its biggest regulators and bringing any more negative attention to the company.

"Both parties are in very deep water," said Thomas Gorman, a former attorney in the SEC’s division of enforcement who now works in private practice at the law firm Porter Wright.

What seems certain is that the two sides will eventually reach a settlement. How quickly that happens remains anyone’s guess. According to several recent reports, Goldman attorneys have met with SEC officials. But the two parties are apparently no closer to an agreement.

Jay Brown, a professor at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law, who focuses on corporate and securities law, said the possibility of a settlement by June 22 was "a very unlikely prospect."

Brown added that even if they were getting nearer to a deal, the parties would probably need more time just to hammer out the details.

Experts have said that one of biggest potential stumbling blocks in any negotiation is the terms of the settlement, versus any fine Goldman might be assessed.

Many believe that Goldman will attempt to seek a deal in which it agrees to lesser charges to avoid any impact on its client base and limit its exposure to the various shareholder suits the company faces. That may be a tough compromise however for the SEC, which is betting its reputation on this case.

"Goldman will want to get rid of that fraud charge and there is no reason for the SEC to drop it now," said Gorman.

One former high-ranking official in the SEC’s enforcement division said dragging out the settlement talks, however, won’t help either party. While the SEC has plenty of other cases to prosecute, Goldman is just as anxious to get out of the spotlight and get back to the business of making money.

"It doesn’t help Goldman or the SEC to have it go on for a long period of time," said the attorney, who requested anonymity out of fear of the impact it could have on business at his current law firm. "If you are going to settle, do it sooner and get it over with." 

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Luby’s Inc. said Thursday that a regulatory panel has ordered Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC to buy back certain auction rate securities from the company.

An arbitration panel of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, or FINRA, ruled Credit Suisse was liable to Luby’s and would have to repurchase the securities and accrued interest.

Houston-based Luby’s (NYSE: LUB) had asserted it had been unable to liquidate its auction rate securities as a result of Credit Suisse’s actions.

Auction-rate securities are debt investments issued by municipalities, student-loan agencies, closed-end funds and others, with interest rates that are reset at weekly or monthly auctions run by the investment firms.

As of Feb. 10, the company’s most recent quarterly filing, Luby’s held $7.1 million par value or $5.2 million fair value in auction rate securities. As a result of the award, Luby’s expects to record a pre-tax gain of approximately $1.8 million, net of expenses, on the sale of investments in its fourth quarter fiscal 2010.

Luby’s filed the FINRA claim against Credit Suisse in October 2008. Luby’s asserted that Credit Suisse knew but failed to disclose to Luby’s that auction rate securities were only liquid at the time because broker-dealers and others were artificially supporting and manipulating the auction market to maintain the appearance of liquidity and stability.

Multiple lawsuits were filed in 2008 by various companies and authorities in Texas, New York and Massachusetts, as well as the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, related to the sale of auction-rate securities at the peak of the credit crunch and financial system meltdown.

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Consumer borrowing posted an unexpected increase in March, only the second gain in the last 14 months. It could be a sign that households are feeling more confident about boosting spending, a key development needed to support a sustained economic recovery.

The Federal Reserve reported Friday that consumer borrowing rose by $1.95 billion in March, better than the $3.85 billion drop that economists had expected.

Consumer credit was also up in January, but other than those two gains, it has been falling steadily since February of last year as households have cut back on their borrowing to repair their battered balance sheets.

The March gain represented a 1 percent rise at an annual rate following a 3 percent drop in February and a 3.2 percent January increase savings account payday loans.

The strength came from a 3.9 percent jump in nonrevolving credit, which includes auto loans. Revolving credit, which covers credit card debt, actually fell by 4.5 percent, the 18th consecutive decline.

The overall increase of 1 percent pushed total credit up to $2.45 trillion at the end of March, down 3.4 percent from a year ago.

Economists are hoping that consumer borrowing will soon stabilize and resume growing, although they caution that the rebound will be restrained by tighter credit conditions imposed by many banks in the wake of the financial crisis.

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China overtook the United States in renewable energy investments for the first time ever in 2009, attracting nearly twice as many dollars and becoming the world’s largest market for clean energy projects.

Renewable energy investments in China - mostly wind farms - totaled $34.6 billion in 2009, according to report released Thursday by the Pew Charitable Trusts and Bloomberg New Energy Finance. In the United States, $18.6 billion was spent.

The report’s authors stressed it was the stable, long-term policies put forth by the Chinese government and easier access to credit that attracted the money, and said the numbers do not bode well for America.

"The United States’ competitive position is at risk in the emerging clean energy economy," Phyllis Cuttino, director of the Pew Environment Group’s Global Warming Campaign, said in a statement.

The report noted that over 700,000 clean energy jobs have been created in the Untied States since 1998, and with so much money being invested in the alternative energy market, this was likely just the beginning.

But with the U.S. losing its dominance in renewable energy, future jobs could be on the line.

Cuttino urged U.S. lawmakers to put a price on carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas emitted from burning fossil fuels. A price on carbon would make fossil fuels more expensive and renewables more competitive. She also said the country needs to mandate that utilities buy a certain percent of their power from renewable sources, and create stable, long-term subsidies for renewable energy.

China uses huge amounts of coal to generate electricity and has famously resisted putting a price on carbon dioxide. But the country does have an aggressive mandate that its utilities use more renewable energy.

There are several bills in Congress that would do what Cuttino is seeking but they face considerable resistance from lawmakers and the general public. Opponents either fear the measures would be too costly to the economy, don’t believe renewable energy is ready for prime time, or don’t think global warming is a major problem.

The investment tallies for China and the United States include all private investments in renewable energy projects, as well as money renewable energy firms raised in stock market offerings, venture capital and private equity deals bad credit pay day loans. They do not include government grants or corporate R&D, which in the United States totaled another $7 billion. How much China spent on government support and corporate R&D was not immediately available.

Globally

Worldwide the report said $162 billion was spent on renewable energy, down just 6.6% from the year before. That compares to a 19% drop in investment in the oil and gas industry, according to the report.

In 2010, Bloomberg New Energy Finance is expecting a 25% increase in renewable energy investments to $200 billion.

Asia, with economies that were less severely hit by the recession and easier access to money, saw a 37% increase in investments in 2009. In Europe and America’s harder hit economies and tighter capital markets, investments dropped 16% and 33% respectively.

In relation to the size of its economy, Spain saw the largest investment, 0.71% of its gross domestic product went into clean energy. Spain was followed by the United Kingdom, China and Brazil. The United States ranked 11th.

Most of the money spent on renewable energy is in the form of power projects, wind farms, solar arrays or other things that actually produce electricity. Only a small part is spent on R&D or capitalizing start-up companies.

Yet when it comes to innovation, the United States is still the world’s leader. The country attracted 60% of all venture capital money spent on renewable energy worldwide. Venture capital generally goes to start-up firms that hold the most promise for future technologies.

"We’re very good at creating companies," John Woolard, chief executive at solar power firm BrightSource Energy, said on a conference call discussing the report. "We’re not doing a very good job creating markets."  

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For those who expect a brutal jobs market and a nervous consumer to threaten the economic recovery this year, a rally in the retail sector is a surprising bright spot.

Even with the market’s most recent run up, the Dow Jones industrial average has gained a modest 3% year to date, while the S&P 500 is up just 4% and the Nasdaq composite has risen a mere 4.6%.

Meanwhile, the retail sector has been staging a stealth rally, with the S&P Retail (RLX) index jumping more than 8% from the start of the year and the Morgan Stanley retail index surging more than 14%. Individual stocks have been even more buoyant, with many of the best performers in the S&P 500, the S&P MidCap 400 and S&P SmallCap 600 coming from the retail sector.

"I think it has to be seen as a good sign," said Bernard McGinn, chief executive of McGinn Investment Management.

He said the stock gains suggest that retailers have become more efficient since the recession. And that has translated into improving sales and profits. On top of that, consumers are starting to loosen their purse strings.

"They’re not spending anywhere near the levels of three years ago, but they are spending more than we thought they would," he said.

A perception that the sector is stabilizing and that the economic recovery will pick up later in the year has brought in some big buyers. But many investors remain wary of the buoyancy in the retail sector amid bets that the current pickup in spending can’t last, particularly with unemployment continuing to rise.

"The gains in consumer discretionary and the retail sector mean people are banking on a powerful recovery that we don’t think is going to happen," said Ben Halliburton, chief investment officer at Tradition Capital Management.

He said he’d rather be in the consumer staples sector because those stocks have a global presence and aren’t tied to the U.S. consumer. Some of the year-to-date winners in that sector include Tyson Foods (TSN, Fortune 500) (+42%), Dr Pepper Snapple Group (DPS, Fortune 500) (+24%) and PepsiCo (PEP, Fortune 500) (+9%).

The fact that many individual investors are unwilling to jump into the retail sector with both feet could also be seen as a positive indicator, from a contrarian viewpoint no fax cash advances.

"Retailers are up a lot, but the overall sentiment is negative and a lot of people are still betting against the stocks," said Ryan Detrick, senior technical strategist at Schaeffer’s Investment Research.

"When you have something helping to lead the market higher yet people are throwing their hands up, that can be a good thing," he explained. "That skepticism can keep driving the stocks higher."

Sales drive stock growth

Still, improving store sales have been translating into share growth for many of the nation’s largest publicly-traded retailers.

December and January same-store sales rose by a larger than expected pace, significant as the two months include the critical holiday period. Easter sales are also expected to have risen 2%. Same-store sales is a retail industry metric that measures stores that have been open a year or more.

Considering the level of insecurity about the economy, the willingness of Americans to spend even moderately more than a year ago is a step in the right direction.

Clothing retailers have spiked 17% year-to-date, led by Ross Stores (ROST, Fortune 500) (up 25.4%) and Abercrombie & Fitch (ANF) (up 24.6%). General merchandisers are up 12%, including Family Dollar Stores (FDO, Fortune 500) (up 27.3%) and Big Lots (BIG, Fortune 500) (up 24.2%). Big department chains are up 11%, including Macy’s (M, Fortune 500) (up 28.6%) and Sears Holdings (SHLD, Fortune 500) (up 24.7%).

Discounters have been outperforming their luxury brethren, unsurprising in a post-recession economy. But the sector as a whole has also been holding up well, despite middling consumer sentiment and an unemployment rate that stood at 9.7% last month.

Aside from traditional retail, consumer discretionary, the category that also includes restaurants, hotels and casinos, is up 8% from the start of the year. That makes it the second-best performing sector this year, narrowly trailing industrials, which include Dow stocks Boeing (BA, Fortune 500) (+29%) and General Electric (GE, Fortune 500) (up 15%). 

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Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown has filled one of the several key vacancies in his administration - without leaving City Hall.

Brown tapped Brendan Mehaffy as the executive director of the Buffalo Office of Strategic Planning, one of the city's primary economic development agencies.

Mehaffy is an attorney in Buffalo's law department. With his appointment, effective March 29, he will be paid $82,257 annually.

Mehaffy replaces the embattled Brian Reilly, who resigned late last year. The department had been run on an interim basis by Drew Eszak, a respected planner.

Brown said he hopes Mehaffy's appointment will bring some stability to a Buffalo office that has been something of a revolving door. Last year, Brown recruited Buffalo native Michael Kimelberg to head the department, but Kimelberg - in a surprise move -decided to remain in Seattle.

Mehaffy's appointment comes just weeks after Brown pledged to update Buffalo's antiquated zoning codes and to merge the Buffalo Urban Renewal Agency and Buffalo Economic Renaissance Corp. into a single, one-stop entity.

"This is an exciting time in our city's history with a variety of development projects changing the city's landscape," Mehaffy said.

Mehaffy holds a bachelor's degree in economics from SUNY Binghamton, a master's degree in urban regional planning from the London School of Economics and is a graduate of the University at Buffalo's School of Law.

"His knowledge of land use planning and project development was honed through both his academic and professional experiences," Brown said. "Brendan has been the city's point person on several high profile projects, including negotiations with the county to return the operation and maintenance of city parks back to Buffalo."

The Buffalo Niagara Partnership, who helped Brown with his search, recommended Mehaffy.

Brown still has to fill other high level administrative vacancies including police and fire chief.

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SunPower Corp. hired Jim Pape to run its residential and commercial business group as part of a reorganization of responsibilities at the company.

Howard Wenger, to whom all SunPower’s business units previously reported, is now president of just the utilities and power plants business group.

The San Jose solar power company (NASDAQ: SPWRA) gave both Pape and Wenger greater responsibility for all profits and losses in their business units.

“Our new business groups have full responsibility for the business results for their groups, not just sales, or just construction,” said company spokeswoman Helen Kendrick no fax needed payday loans.

Pape’s position — president of residential and commercial — is a new job at the company. No one else was hired directly as part of the reorganization, Kendrick said, although existing employee teams will be assigned to the new business groups.

Pape worked previously at Trane Commercial Systems.

SunPower, led by CEO Tom Werner, has a large facility in the rehabbed Ford Point factory in Richmond.

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