NWH-9-18-2013 by Shaw Media

Business

SECTION E Wednesday, September 18, 2013

APPEARS INSIDE TODAY

Breaking news @ www.NWHerald.com

Business Journal editor: Brett Rowland • browland@shawmedia.com

15529.73

Driving school expands in CL

27.85

Top Driver opens after Northwest Suburban Driving School closes

THE MARKETS 34.95

3745.70

7.16 1704.76

OIL

$105.53 a barrel -$1.06

THE STOCKS Stock

Abbott Labs AbbVie AGL Resources Allstate

Apple AptarGroup AT&T Bank of Montreal Baxter CME Group Coca-Cola Comcast Covidien Dean Foods Dow Chemical Exelon Exxon Facebook Ford General Motors Google Hillshire IBM JPMorganChase Kohl’s Kraft Foods Group Live Nation McDonald’s Microsoft Modine Moto Solutions OfficeMax Pepsi Pulte Homes Safeway Sears Holdings Snap-On Southwest Air. Supervalu Target United Contint. Wal-Mart Walgreen Waste Mgmt. Wintrust Fincl.

Change

34.97 47.60 44.73 51.19 455.32 59.51 34.75 65.52 71.58 71.95 38.79 44.45 61.72 19.60 39.71 30.34 88.94 45.07 17.44 36.71 886.11 31.81 192.16 53.09 51.88 55.00 17.29 97.92 32.93 14.22 58.28 11.24 81.66 17.00 30.99 62.03 99.74 14.22 7.70 64.38 32.95 75.15 54.92 41.19 40.72

-0.04 +1.78 +0.26 +0.68 +5.20 -0.81 +0.18 +0.53 -0.34 +0.22 -0.07 +0.03 +0.41 +0.13 -0.09 +0.12 +0.27 +2.56 +0.09 +0.49 -1.65 -0.07 -0.99 -0.05 +0.38 +0.21 +0.14 +0.21 +0.13 +0.60 +0.47 +0.09 +0.64 -0.14 +2.95 +0.68 +0.15 +0.12 +0.31 +0.59 +0.29 +0.37 +0.14 -0.21 +0.32

COMMODITIES Metal

Gold Silver Copper

1310.40 -7.40 21.755 -0.254 3.2245 +0.0025

Grain (cents per bushel) Close

Corn Soybeans Oats Wheat

454.00 1342.50 306.75 643.00

Livestock

Live cattle Feeder cattle Lean hogs

124.825 157.85 91.15

Northwest Herald

Page E3

By JIM DALLKE jdallke@shawmedia.com CRYSTAL LAKE – Less than two weeks after Northwest Suburban Driving School unexpectedly closed its doors, another driving school has moved to Crystal Lake. Top Driver Driving School has signed a lease with Terra Cotta Corners, located at 650 E. Terra Cotta Ave. The driving school plans to take on students displaced by Northwest Suburban Driving School, and CEO Paul Zalatoris said he will offer discounted classes to those who were left hanging in the middle of their training. “We were moving real fast,” Za-

latoris said. “We kind of [signed a lease] in record breaking time. “I thought it would be a good opportunity for us as a company and a chance to help students and parents impacted by the sudden closing of Northwest,” Zalatoris said. Top Driver has 30 locations in the Chicago area, and 40 additional schools in Michigan and Ohio. Zalatoris said he saw Northwest Suburban Driving School’s closing as a chance to expand the company to an area in need of driving schools. “We weren’t looking for this,” he said. “Northwest was a large school. There was no need to try and go into [McHenry County]. That wasn’t a target of ours. It’s a small industry, and you don’t step on your com-

petitors’ toes. But with them moving out, there was a need to replace Northwest. There was an opportunity for us.” On Sept. 6, Northwest Suburban Driving School, the state’s third largest driving school, closed all 10 of its Chicago area locations without informing any of its students or their parents. The Secretary of State’s office said the school closed for financial reasons, and it’s Crystal Lake landlord said the company owed $2,021.25 for past-due rent. Top Driver has begun reaching out to former Northwest Suburban Driving students and plans to hold classes for Marian Central High School students Wednesday. A special class for students who were in

the middle of the classroom portion of driver training at Northwest Suburban will be held Monday at Top Driver’s Crystal Lake location. A regular schedule for new drivers will begin “quickly thereafter,” Zalatoris said. In what Zalatoris called a “goodwill promotion” to affected Northwest Suburban students, Top Driver will charge $240 to students who need to finish the classroom and driving portion of the class, essentially offering the remaining classroom sessions at no cost, he said. Top Driver also absorbed six of Northwest Suburban’s former employees and has begun training them on company policies and procedures, Zalatoris said.

Slower holiday sales predicted

WORLD ECONOMY

By MAE ANDERSON The Associated Press

row and spend. Though U.S. hiring and growth remain soft, some Fed officials don’t think the bond purchases are doing much good anymore. • “Tapering,” as the Fed’s expected pullback in bond purchases has come to be known, won’t significantly disrupt the U.S. stock and bond markets. “That’s because it’s been so well-telegraphed,” said Jerry Webman, chief economist at OppenheimerFunds. Investors already have driven up the yield on the 10-year Treasury bond about 1.2 percentage points beyond its level in late May, when Chairman Ben Bernanke first suggested the Fed could slow its purchases by year’s end. • The biggest obstacles to faster U.S. growth vary – from tepid job and pay growth to the lingering squeeze from a Social Security tax increase and government spending cuts to doubts about whether Congress will raise the government’s borrowing cap. If the cap isn’t raised, the U.S. could default on its debt by mid-October. That would risk a downgrade of U.S. credit. • The U.S. unemployment rate won’t return to a range associated with a healthy economy – roughly 5 percent to 6 percent – before 2015 and perhaps not until 2016 or later. The

Coming off of a weak back-to-school shopping period, a research firm expects holiday sales growth will be slower this year during the crucial holiday season. Shoppers also are expected to visit fewer stores as they research purchases online. Retail revenue in November and December should rise 2.4 percent during the biggest shopping period of the year, Chicago-based research firm ShopperTrak said Tuesday. That compares with a 3 percent increase in 2012 from 2011. “Although the economy continues to recover slowly, consumers remain cautious about spending and are not ready to splurge,” ShopperTrak founder Bill Martin said. While the job picture has been improving in the U.S. and the turnaround in the housing market is gaining traction, the improvements have not been enough to sustain higher levels of spending for most Americans. Most continue to juggle tepid wage gains with a higher cost of living. Revenue at stores opened at least a year – a measure of a retailer’s health – rose 3.6 percent in August, according to a tally of 10 retailers by the International Council of Shopping Centers. That’s up a tad from July’s 3.5 percent gain, but below the 6 percent gain in August last year. The cautious spending last month capped a weak back-to-school selling season for retailers and raised questions about whether Americans would spend in November and December, a time retailers can make up to 40 percent of their revenue for the year. ShopperTrak expects traffic will fall 1.4 percent during November and December, compared with a 2.5 percent increase in 2012. That’s partly due to people researching purchases more diligently before they go out shopping, Martin said. “They’re still purchasing the same amount and product they intended to, they’re just not roaming from store to store looking for it,” he said. In addition, there’s a shorter shopping window between Black Friday – the day after Thanksgiving, which is usually the biggest shopping day of the year – and Christmas. Last year there were 32 days during the period, and this year there are 25. Weekends are the busi-

See SURVEY, page E2

See HOLIDAY, page E2

AP photo

Traders work on the floor this month at the New York Stock Exchange. An Associated Press poll of more than two dozen economists released Tuesday suggests that global growth will remain below full health into 2014.

Sluggish economic recovery ahead

Change

-2.50 -5.75 -4.75 +1.75 Change

-0.725 -1.65 -0.975

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AP survey says global growth will be weak By CHRISTOPHER S. RUGABER The Associated Press WASHINGTON – A robust recovery for the global economy remains well out of reach. That’s the view that emerges from a survey of economists just as the Federal Reserve is expected this week to reduce its stimulus for the U.S. economy. Europe finally has emerged from recession. Japan is growing after two decades of stagnation. And the U.S. is trudging ahead. Yet an Associated Press survey of more than two dozen economists suggests global growth will remain below full health this year and next. Persistently weak growth would make it harder to resolve many of the world’s biggest economic challenges. They include historically high unemployment in Europe, sluggish spending by consumers and businesses in the U.S., heavy government debts in Europe and Japan, and unstable economies in some emerging nations. The economists think the 17 nations that use the euro will grow at an annual rate barely above 1 percent in the second half of 2013 and in 2014. From April through June, the eurozone eked out its first quarterly growth after 18 months of contraction – a 1.2 percent annual rate. No accel-

eration is foreseen in the next year and a half. The U.S. and Japan are expected to fare only slightly better. The economists think the U.S. economy will grow at a 2.3 percent annual rate in the second half of 2013 and 2.6 percent in 2014. Japan is expected to grow 2.2 percent next year – far weaker than its 3.8 percent growth rate from April through June. Normally, a healthy expansion in advanced economies produces annual growth of 3 percent or better. The U.S. expanded at an average pace of 3.25 percent from 1976 through 2007. But it hasn’t grown at a 3 percent rate or faster since 2005. “Most economies are growing so slowly ... you don’t know one day from the next if it’s getting better or getting worse,” said Susan Sterne, an economist at Economic Analysis Associates. The AP survey collected the views of private, corporate and academic economists on a range of issues. Among their views: • The Fed will start reducing its $85 billion in monthly bond purchases after its latest policy meeting ends Wednesday. The initial cut in purchases will be small – $10 billion a month. The Fed’s bond purchases have been intended to keep long-term loan rates low to induce people to bor-