Business News

Business News

The Department of Labor says the economy added 113,000 jobs in January. The private sector added 142,000 and government cut 29,000 jobs.  Big gains were in construction and manufacturing jobs and big losses were in the retail sector. The unemployment rate stands at 6.6%, the lowest since October of 2008. (Department of Labor)

Oregon programmable chipmaker Lattice Semiconductor posted sales 36% higher than last year and turned last year’s loss into a $6.5 million quarterly profit.  Lattice has been restructuring and reinventing itself over the last couple years and it is starting to pay off.  Sales in 2014 are expected to grow in the double digits. (Market Wire)

Ever since the Federal Reserve slowed its bond buying program interest rates have been surprisingly falling.  That has driven a 30-year fixed rate mortgage to 4.23% at the end of January.  That is the 3rd straight month of decline. (Associated Press)

Nordstrom will close two long-time northwest locations.  The Vancouver Westfield Mall and Lloyd Center locations will close by January of 2015. That will mean the loss of 220 Oregon jobs.  The company said while the stores were profitable they did not generate revenues robust enough to warrant the costs of needed remodeling. (PR Newswire)

Join us Saturday at 10 for Financial Focus when we will talk about the recent market downturn and our outlook for the economy.
 

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Lars Larson
Lars Larson
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