VOL. 38 | NO. 4 | Friday, January 24, 2014
Ever since ground was broken on the Music City Center, the fate of its predecessor, the Nashville Convention Center, has been in flux. And settled. And in flux again.
Top 2013 commercial real estate transactions for Davidson, Williamson, Rutherford, Wilson and Sumner counties, as compiled by Chandler Reports.
REALTY CHECK
The Inman News Service holds two conferences each year for Realtors called Inman Connect, one in New York in January and another in San Francisco each July. These conferences are well-attended by Realtors from all over the country and feature panels composed of founders, CEOs and presidents from many of the top companies, giving the attendees a look into the future of all things real estate.
TERRY McCORMICK
New Vanderbilt football coach Derek Mason will face something that no other Commodores coach has faced in the last half century – high expectations.
NEWSMAKERS
Attorney Carolyn Schott has joined the law firm of Sherrard & Roe, PLC, as a member.
GUERRILLA MARKETING
CEO-level sales calls are to salespeople what marathons are to runners. Neither is for the faint of heart, but with risk sometimes comes great reward.
THE WORLDLY INVESTOR
S&P 500 corporate earnings in 2013 likely grew about 6 percent. The S&P 500 price index, however, grew 29.6 percent. The difference between the growth in earnings and the growth in the price index amounts to P/E expansion.
I SWEAR
“Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee.”
KAY'S COOKING CORNER
Every year around Super Bowl time, I start searching the TV, Internet, cookbooks and newspapers, anything I can put my hands on to find new or interesting recipes for your upcoming Super Bowl party.
STATE LEGISLATURE
NASHVILLE (AP) - Local governments could hold votes on whether to allow wine sales in supermarkets and convenience stores, under a bill the state Senate passed on Thursday.
NASHVILLE AREA
WAUKESHA, Wis. (AP) — Stressing the need to train workers for jobs of the future, President Barack Obama kicked off a government-wide review of federal job-training programs Thursday and pledged to expand the ones that work best.
STATEWIDE
NASHVILLE (AP) — Tennessee is among three states receiving high marks for their teacher policies.
NATIONAL BUSINESS
WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. economy grew at a 3.2 percent annual rate in the October-December quarter on the strength of the strongest consumer spending in three years, an encouraging sign for 2014.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Fewer Americans signed contracts to buy previously occupied homes in December, suggesting a slowdown in real estate. Pending home sales fell to the lowest point since October 2011.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Weekly applications for U.S. unemployment benefits rose 19,000 last week to 348,000, the highest in about a month. But the broader trend in applications remains low.
NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks were sharply higher Thursday, erasing most of Wednesday's losses, as investors cheered strong earnings from Facebook and an encouraging report that the U.S. economy grew at a robust annual rate of 3.2 percent in the fourth quarter.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Average U.S. rates for fixed mortgages slipped this week as new data showed a decline in home prices in November and a drop in new homes sales last month.
The price of oil was little changed Thursday after a big drop in heating oil supplies was offset by the Federal Reserve's decision to further reduce its stimulus.
Exxon Mobil's profit fell 16 percent from last year as the company produced slightly less oil and gas. But it still made more than $8.3 billion in three months.
AMSTERDAM (AP) — Shell, Europe's largest oil company, will stop drilling for oil in Alaska this year as it cuts back on investments and tries to reverse a steep drop in earnings.
MILWAUKEE (AP) — Harley-Davidson's fourth-quarter earnings rose 6.8 percent as motorcycle sales continued to rise worldwide.
NATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — House Republican leaders plan to outline broad immigration principles, including legalization for the 11 million immigrants living here illegally, to the GOP rank and file as they look to revive long-stalled efforts to overhaul the nation's immigration system.
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 29
MIDSTATE
NASHVILLE (AP) — Italian gun maker Beretta said Wednesday that Tennessee's support for gun rights was a major factor in its decision to build a manufacturing and research facility in the Nashville suburb of Gallatin.
MUSIC INDUSTRY
NASHVILLE (AP) - Miranda Lambert and Tim McGraw are the top nominees for this year's Academy of Country Music Awards.
NASHVILLE (AP) — The Musicians Hall of Fame inducted 12 new members across the genres, including bluesman Buddy Guy, British rock guitarist Peter Frampton and pedal steel player and country singer Barbara Mandrell.
STATE LEGISLATURE
NASHVILLE (AP) — A proposal that seeks to do away with local government's power to decide whether to allow firearms in public parks advanced to a full Senate vote on Tuesday despite opposition from the governor.
COURTS
NASHVILLE (AP) — The Governor's Commission for Judicial Appointments is now taking applications to fill an upcoming vacancy on the state Supreme Court.
STATEWIDE
NASHVILLE (AP) — The Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation says applications are now available for energy education camps for teachers.
HEALTH CARE
WASHINGTON (AP) — Maybe the health care law was about wealth transfer, after all.
AUTO INDUSTRY
DETROIT (AP) — Chrysler and Fiat will be known as Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV as they move forward together as a single company.
DETROIT (AP) — Chrysler and Fiat will be known as Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV as they move forward together as a single company.
NATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — Facebook says its earnings and revenue continued to grow in the latest quarter, surpassing Wall Street's expectations on both fronts as it expanded the number of users and the amount of money it makes on mobile ads.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Federal Reserve is pushing ahead with a plan to shrink its bond-buying program because of a strengthening U.S. economy. It's doing so even though the prospect of reduced Fed stimulus and higher U.S. interest rates has rattled global markets.
NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks are sharply lower following weak earnings from several U.S. companies, more trouble in emerging markets and economic stimulus cuts from the Federal Reserve.
NEW YORK (AP) — The price of oil was flat Wednesday as a big drop in heating oil supplies was offset by a decision by the U.S. Federal Reserve to further reduce its stimulus program.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama's plan to raise the minimum wage for federally contracted workers is winning praise from unions and labor activists, but it could take a year or more before any hikes take place and the impact may not be as widespread as some advocates had hoped.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Relatively few Americans — less than 5 percent of hourly workers — toil for the minimum wage today.
NATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — After years of setbacks, a nearly $100 billion-a-year compromise farm bill cleared the House on Wednesday despite strong opposition from conservatives who sought a bigger cut in food stamps.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama's year of action could amount to a lot of running in place.
WASHINGTON (AP) — It seems to be something of an occupational hazard for President Barack Obama: When he talks about his health care law, he's bound to hit a fact bump sooner or later.
WASHINGTON (AP) — At the dawn of an election year, congressional Republicans responded swiftly and sharply to President Barack Obama's State of the Union vow to act on his own if lawmakers won't cooperate on "creating new jobs, not creating new crises" in a nation with a yawning income gap.
TUESDAY, JANUARY 28
STATE LEGISLATURE
NASHVILLE (AP) - The House committee that killed last year's version of a bill to allow wine sales in Tennessee grocery stores on Tuesday overwhelmingly voted in favor of giving cities the ability to hold referendums on the proposal.
NASHVILLE (AP) — The state Senate has put off a vote about a proposal seeking to change the way Tennessee's attorney general gains office.
STATEWIDE
NASHVILLE (AP) - Gov. Bill Haslam has appointed a task force to study the state's school funding formula.
Attorneys general for more than a dozen states, including Tennessee, have ordered several for-profit education companies to turn over information on the firms' business practices.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam has been named policy chairman of the Republican Governors Public Policy Committee.
AUTO INDUSTRY
DEARBORN, Mich. (AP) — Ford Motor Co. enjoyed one of the best years in its history in 2013, but the celebration won't last long.
NATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — Investors' jitters over emerging markets faded on Tuesday and U.S. stocks rose for the first time in four days.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. consumer confidence has risen to its highest point since August on the strength of a brighter view of the job market and business conditions.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. home prices fell slightly in November as colder weather slowed buying, ending nine straight months of price gains.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Businesses cut back sharply on their orders for long-lasting manufactured goods in December with a key category that signals business investment plans falling by the biggest amount in five months.
The price of oil rose nearly 2 percent Tuesday, reversing the losses from the previous two sessions.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The nation's college and university endowments — often used to fund scholarships and professorships — had strong growth last year, according to a report released Tuesday. That's a bit of good news for higher education institutions under pressure to hold down tuition costs amid some enrollment declines.
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Comcast Corp. added 43,000 video subscribers in the fourth quarter — the first quarterly gain in six and a half years — as the nation's top cable TV company said that uptake of its X1 set-top box helped it retain customers and boost video-on-demand spending.
NEW YORK (AP) — Google Glass is getting glasses. Google is adding prescription frames and new styles of detachable sunglasses to its computerized, Internet-connected goggles known as Glass.
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — It's going to take more than brisk sales of the iPhone and iPad to convince investors that Apple still has the magic touch.
NATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — Challenging lawmakers, President Barack Obama will announce Tuesday night in his State of the Union address that he's raising the minimum wage for new federal contract workers to $10.10 an hour, underscoring a go-it-alone strategy in an election year critical to both parties and the balance of power in Congress.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The CEO of General Motors and an immigrant brought to the U.S. illegally as a child will join first lady Michelle Obama to watch President Barack Obama deliver his State of the Union address on Tuesday.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama will sign an executive order setting the minimum wage for workers under new federal contracts at $10.10 an hour, the White House said Tuesday. The president will announce the increase during his State of the Union address.
WASHINGTON (AP) — House Speaker John Boehner says President Barack Obama likely has the authority to raise the minimum wage for new federal contract workers. But the speaker warned against any other unilateral steps that could encroach on the Constitution.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Farm-state lawmakers are lobbying colleagues member by member, vote by vote as they push for House passage of a massive, five year farm bill that would make cuts to food stamps and continue generous subsidies for farmers.
MONDAY, JANUARY 27
NASHVILLE AREA
NASHVILLE (AP) - Southern Baptist Convention leaders are hosting a summit in Nashville that will focus on sex. The topics will range from pornography, teen sex, homosexuality and how pastors can talk to their congregations about human sexuality.
NASHVILLE (AP) — Nashville Mayor Karl Dean and the Nashville Sounds baseball team are hosting a ceremonial groundbreaking for a new minor league ballpark that will return Nashville baseball to its historic home.
STATEWIDE
NASHVILLE (AP) - The debate over a school voucher program in Tennessee is heating up with groups for and against speaking out this week at the state Capitol complex.
NASHVILLE (AP) - An audit of the Tennessee Department of Children's Services finds that the state child-welfare agency has had numerous problems, including sloppy child-abuse investigations.
STATE LEGISLATURE
NASHVILLE (AP) — The state Senate is scheduled to take up a measure on Monday that seeks to change the way Tennessee's attorney general gains office.
ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — Minimum-wage increase proposals are getting the maximum push from Democrats in statehouses in more than half of U.S. states, highlighting the politically potent income inequality issue this year.
Some minimum wage legislation and initiatives in states around the nation:
AUTO INDUSTRY
RUESSELSHEIM, Germany (AP) — New General Motors chief Mary Barra is stressing the company's support for its struggling Adam Opel AG subsidiary in Europe, saying Opel workers will get the job of building a new vehicle at the company's main plant in Germany.
HEALTH CARE
WASHINGTON (AP) — Memo to the White House: The website may be fixed, but President Barack Obama's new health insurance markets have yet to win over most consumers.
NATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks are slightly lower on Wall Street, moderating their losses after a rout last week.
NEW YORK (AP) — The price of oil fell below $96 a barrel Monday amid forecasts for moderating temperatures in the U.S. Northeast and anticipation for the next meeting of the U.S. central bank.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Just as Ben Bernanke prepares to turn the chairmanship of the Federal Reserve over to Janet Yellen, global markets are on edge over the prospect that she'll extend a policy he began: a steady pullback in the Fed's extraordinary economic stimulus.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. sales of new homes fell in December for a second consecutive month but even with the pause at the end of the year, sales for all of 2013 climbed to the highest level in five years.
NEW YORK (AP) — American shoppers say they are very concerned about the safety of their personal information following a massive security breach at Target, but many aren't taking steps to ensure their data is more secure, says a new Associated Press--GfK Poll.
Businesses expect their companies to perform better this year but that optimism still isn't translating into a push to hire more workers, according to a new survey from the National Association for Business Economics.
NEW YORK (AP) — Caterpillar used a combination of cost-cutting and strong sales of construction equipment to deliver a fourth-quarter profit that topped Wall Street estimates and gave the sagging stock market some needed support.
WASHINGTON (AP) — From the White House to the Vatican to the business elite in Davos, Switzerland, one issue keeps seizing the agenda: the growing gap between the very wealthy and everyone else.
FRIDAY, JANUARY 24
STATE LEGISLATURE
NASHVILLE (AP) - Gov. Bill Haslam says he has "major concerns" about a measure supported by fellow Republicans in the Legislature seeking to do away with local government's power to decide whether to allow firearms in public parks.
NASHVILLE (AP) - The full Senate is scheduled to vote next week on a proposal to allow wine to be sold in Tennessee supermarkets, while a House committee that derailed last year's version is set to consider reviving the measure.
NASHVILLE (AP) - Republican state lawmakers have proposed a school voucher bill they hope will be acceptable to Gov. Bill Haslam, who has repeatedly said he favors a more limited version of the program that gives parents another option for educating their children.
STATEWIDE
A former aide to U.S. Sen. Lamar Alexander hanged himself in his parents' basement in Maryland, just weeks after his arrest on child pornography charges, officials said Friday.
NASHVILLE (AP) — The Senate Republican Caucus has appointed Thomas W. Lawless to the Tennessee Registry of Election Finance.
AUTO INDUSTRY
WASHINGTON (AP) — Nissan went too far with a TV commercial that depicts its Frontier pickup truck powering up a sandy hill to save a struggling dune buggy, according to the Federal Trade Commission.
DETROIT (AP) — General Motors Co.'s new CEO, Mary Barra, says she will largely keep in place the plans of her predecessor, from a restructuring in Europe to a focus on improving profit margins. But she hopes to accelerate that progress.
HEALTH CARE
WASHINGTON (AP) — It may just be the start of a new trend. The uninsured rate dropped modestly this month as expanded coverage rolled out under President Barack Obama's health care law, a major survey released Thursday has found.
NATIONAL BUSINESS
NEW YORK (AP) — The frigid winter of 2014 is setting the price of natural gas on fire.
NEW YORK (AP) — The U.S. stock market is swooning as investors fear slower global economic growth.
NEW YORK (AP) — The price of oil slipped a bit Friday, but still finished the week with a gain of more than 2 percent. A sell-off in global equity markets may have weighed on oil traders' sentiments, producing the first losing day of the week.
NEW YORK (AP) — JPMorgan Chase almost doubled Chairman and CEO Jamie Dimon's pay for 2013, rewarding the executive for settling probes against the bank.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The nation's union membership held steady at 11.3 percent last year, but losses among state and government workers suggest an ominous trend for the future of organized labor.
WASHINGTON (AP) — A government warning about the dangers of increased use of trains to transport crude oil is giving a boost to supporters of the long-delayed Keystone XL pipeline.
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Outspoken billionaire Carl Icahn has tossed another bushel of Apple stock into his investment portfolio as he tries to persuade the iPhone maker to buy back more of its own shares.
NEW YORK (AP) — Look around. Many of the gadgets you see drew inspiration from the original Mac computer.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Young Americans from low-income families are as likely to move into the ranks of the affluent today as those born in the 1970s, according to a report by several top academic experts on inequality.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Those nutrition labels on the back of food packages may soon become easier to read.
NATIONAL POLITICS
WASHINGTON (AP) — A sharply divided government task force that reviewed the National Security Agency's surveillance program for four months has urged President Barack Obama to shut down the agency's bulk collection of phone data and purge its massive inventory of millions of Americans' calling records, The Associated Press has learned.