PhillyInc

The official tally is in and the numbers confirm that 2007 was a very good year to be running a hotel in Center City and across the region. If you were on the other end of the equation, paying for hotel rooms, of course, you may not be quite as pleased.

According to data compiled by Smith Travel Research and vetted by PKF Consulting in Philadelphia, Center City hotels had an occupancy rate of 73.6 percent, a fraction above 2006 and the best year since 1997. But the demand was strong enough that hoteliers were able to push up their average daily rate to record territory: $156.56, a 7.3 percent increase compared with 2006.

Throughout the metro area, occupancy wasn't as strong, finishing at 68.8 percent in 2007, compared with 69.4 percent the year before. Demand was healthy enough, though, for the average daily rate to climb 6.7 percent, to $119.14 from $111.71.

- Tom Belden

Merck & Co. Inc. is under investigation by a grand jury over its sales and marketing practices for its withdrawn pain reliever, Vioxx, according to the Wall Street Journal.

The newspaper cites a person familiar with the matter. Merck declined to comment to the paper.

- Mike Armstrong

On this first Friday of the month, the Bureau of Labor Statistics says that the unemployment rate for January remained at 4.9 percent.

The number of employed people declined by 17,000 between December and January. The preliminary estimate of nonfarm employment was 138.1 million people.

The number of unemployed remained at 7.6 million in January.

- Mike Armstrong

Not a day goes by without the financial sector being rocked by news involving write-downs, downgrades and defaults.

It was a relief to read Alfred P. West Jr.'s quote in Wednesday's earnings announcement for SEI Investments Co.:

We continue to be satisfied with the progress we are making, even in the face of difficulties created by the capital and credit markets.

West is the chief executive officer of the Oaks provider of automation systems to financial-services companies and transaction-processing services for money managers. His company was profiled in Monday's Business section.

All SEI did in 2007 was increase revenue 16 percent to $1.37 billion while its net income grew 10 percent to $259.8 million.

That net income was lowered by a $25.1 million charge related to two SEI-sponsored money market funds that owned securities issued by Cheyne Finance L.L.C. , a structured investment vehicle that was declared insolvent last fall.

So even a brush with some tainted collateralized debt obligations and mortgage-backed securities couldn't ruin SEI's solid year.

- Mike Armstrong

Last fall, Vernon W. Hill II set up a new private-investment firm in Chevy Chase, Md. with a former bank analyst.

Now, the founder of Commerce Bancorp Inc. has been named co-chairman of Bankstocks.com, a Web site started by a hedge fund manager. According to a post, Hill will be writing about the financial services industry for the Web site:

You may agree with Vernon or disagree with him - but you'll rarely fail to find his views thoughtful and provocative.

But apparently he'll be more than a "content provider." The post by Bankstocks.com co-founder Thomas Brown says that "Hill will apply his considerable enterpreneurial skills to help transform Bankstocks.com into the 'go-to' site for financial services executives and employees."

Brown positively gushes about Hill, calling him "perhaps the most successful and innovative banker of his time."

While he recounts "the Vernon Hill story" in the post, he omitted a chapter: Hill was ousted by the board of Commerce Bancorp last summer.

- Mike Armstrong

Reason No. 359 for why I love Form 8-K filings:

Ace Ltd. , the Bermuda-based insurer with major operations in Philadelphia, announced that its former CEO, Brian Duperreault, resigned from the board Jan. 29.

Old news, I know. But today Ace filed its 8-K on the announcement and it provides this morsel:

In connection with Mr. Duperreault's resignation, the Compensation Committee approved a cash severance payment to Mr. Duperreault in the amount of $4,950,000 as compensation for his past service to ACE Limited.

So not only did Duperreault get a new job - CEO of Marsh & McLennan Cos. Inc. - but also a nice parting gift. (Still waiting for Marsh to file its 8-K on what it's paying Duperreault.)

- Mike Armstrong

Losses are rarely good news for investors. But Orleans Homebuilders Inc. shares soared 56 percent last week even after airing its substantial red ink from its latest earnings report. Of course, the Bensalem company also detailed the steps it's taking to restructure its operations.

That made Orleans the biggest mover among local non-penny stocks. Add in recent interest rate cuts, and some investors may be hoping the worst is behind the builders.

- Mike Armstrong

Ah, to be paid to leave your job and then paid to take your next.

That's what it's like when companies recruit new CEOs. And Brian Duperreault, the nonexecutive chairman of Ace Ltd. , the Bermuda-based insurer with major operations in Philadelphia, is the latest to benefit.

Duperreault, 60, was hired last week by New York-based Marsh & McLennan Cos. Inc. In him, Marsh saw an executive who took Ace from a tiny insurer specializing in catastrophes into a multiline insurer.

The board of Marsh, an insurance brokerage that actually helped spawn Ace in 1985, moved fast after deciding Dec. 21 it needed to replace Michael G. Cherkasky, who had been CEO since late 2004.

Cherkasky had helped stabilize a company that was rocked by charges by then-New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer’s office of bid-rigging and taking kickbacks from insurance companies. But shareholders last year began to grumble about Marsh's flat financial performance.

Comcast Corp. boosted the size of its bank credit line to $7 billion from $5 billion, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The Philadelphia cable television and Internet services provider said it had no balance on that credit line as of Jan. 30.

Is this a case of raising debt when you can, or preparing for some sort of deal?

Comcast is rumored to be a player any time a big media property is up for sale. After all, it is the nation's biggest cable company.

- Mike Armstrong

A reader points out that former Ace Ltd. CEO Brian Duperreault pledged $10 million to St. Joseph's University in early 2006.

The money was donated to help fund the purchase of Episcopal Academy's Merion campus. And it was one of the largest gifts in St. Joseph's history. (The other was a $10 million gift by James J. Maguire, another insurance industry executive, in 2005.)

At the time, the Jesuit university had said that Duperreault's gift would be honored "with a future naming opportunity."

University spokeswoman Harriet Goodheart says that Duperreault declined to have buildings named after himself or his family. Rather, he requested that the City Avenue residence halls be named for former St. Joseph's president Nicholas Rashford and Francis Borgia, "an early companion of St. Ignatius of Loyola," Goodheart said.

Duperreault is a St. Joe's alum, having graduated in 1969 with a bachelor's degree in mathematics. He is also a former member of its board of trustees.

- Mike Armstrong

Public funding of stadiums irks many people who aren't sports fans. What frosts me is when it is painted as economic stimulus.

Study after study of the economic impact of sports stadiums has shown them to be poor uses of public funds. Rick Eckstein, a Villanova University sociology professor who's written extensively about the phenomenon for more than a decade, has yet to find any such project that has revitalized an area.

But still stadiums are sold that way. Look at the New Jersey Devils arena in Newark, and the New Jersey Nets arena in Brooklyn.

Even if you assume that it's important to the image of a city to remain a four-sport city (football, baseball, basketball, hockey) and that somehow justifies spending what it takes to keep it so, how does that explain public funding for soccer?

Call it a show of faith: Unisys Corp. executives bought more than 100,000 shares over the last week.

Those actions follow the words of Unisys CEO Joseph McGrath, who said Jan. 29 that investors would be seeing "a commitment from the senior team in support of our confidence" in the computer company whose shares have declined 53 percent in the last year.

Unisys has been under pressure from a hedge fund that has demanded changes, including the sale or spin-off of its federal government business.

McGrath made his comments on an earnings call, and one analyst said he views management stock purchases as a positive sign.

Nine Unisys executives bought a total of 137,480 shares Jan. 31 through Feb. 4, according to filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. While McGrath accounted for much of that insider buying — 80,500 shares — executives at the vice president level participated in the vote of confidence.

In all, management spent a total of $574,050, paying between $4.10 and $4.35, to boost their holdings in the Blue Bell company. (Yes, that was their own money.) McGrath invested nearly a quarter-million dollars.

- Mike Armstrong

WorldGate Communications Inc. shut down in Trevose last week.

Founded in 1995 by Hal M. Krisbergh, the company developed a video phone but has made few inroads in the competitive market.

According to an SEC filing on Tuesday, WorldGate has been in a dispute with its largest customer, which has refused to pay up. Short on cash, WorldGate said it ceased operations "as a first step to winding down its business."

WorldGate has been a penny stock since late 2005 when its price slipped below $3. Shares closed at 8 cents yesterday, down 7 cents.

The company had 70 employees as of the end of 2006.

Without new financing, WorldGate may gone from the world.

- Mike Armstrong

Toll Bros. Inc. this morning released a preliminary report on its first-quarter revenues, contracts and backlog.

And chairman and CEO Robert I. Toll summed it up this way:

The housing market remains very weak in most areas. Based on current traffic and deposits, we are not yet seeing much light at the end of the tunnel.

Home-building revenues were $842.7 million, down 22 percent from the first quarter of 2007. Backlog for the Horsham builder of luxury homes was $2.4 billion, down 42 percent.

The company reported gross signed contracts of $573.2 million and 904 homes, down 46 percent and 38 percent respectively.

- Mike Armstrong

Ever wonder how much you are worth to marketers?

An unsolicited email from a database company provides some answers. The company, from California, sent along its price list.

Judging by the list, names of Canadian certified financial planners, architects, librarians and "property management decision makers" are worth more than the names of chief executives and presidents.

A database of 4,000 "property management decision makers," is available for $2,000. That's 50 cents a name. By contrast, databases with 30,000 chief executives and presidents, or 30,000 finance executives can be bought for $3,000 each, or 10 cents a CEO.
- Jane M. Von Bergen

Before you send your next e-mail, double-check that "To..." field.

There's a lawyer at Philadelphia's Pepper Hamilton firm who wishes she did.

Portfolio.com says that instead of sending client correspondence to another attorney at Chicago-based Sidley Austin, the Pepper Hamilton lawyer e-mailed it to New York Times reporter Alex Berenson.

As Portfolio.com reported on its Web site, that was particularly touchy because Pepper Hamilton's client was Eli Lilly & Co. and Berenson writes about Big Pharma. Portfolio.com cited an unnamed pharmaceutical consultant who said the e-mail was intended for Bradford Berenson at Sidley Austin.

The Conde Nast property said the Times' Berenson received confidential information about settlement negotiations between Lilly and the U.S. Attorney's Office in Philadelphia involving improper marketing of the schizophrenia drug, Zyprexa. Berenson did write a story that appeared Jan. 31 that said prosecutors and Lilly were discussing a $1 billion settlement of a civil and criminal investigation.

Wow, what luck. The story sailed all over the Web. But one blogger was prompted to ask more questions.

The Drug and Device Law blog called Alex Berenson who said he did get an e-mail inadvertently from Pepper Hamilton, but it didn't have details about settlement talks. He got those from sources other than Pepper. (Berenson confirmed the blog's account.)

As for Pepper Hamilton, executive partner Robert E. Heideck said he would not comment because "this involves a firm client."

- Mike Armstrong

When Federal Reserve Bank presidents speak, the markets listen. Philly Fed CEO Charles I. Plosser spoke to the rotary club in his hometown of Birmingham, Ala., and sounded the inflation alarm once again.

"Ignoring price stability during times of economic weakness risks undermining our ability to achieve economic growth over the long run," he said.

"We cannot be confident that a slow-growing economy in early 2008 will by itself reduce inflation."

So while Plosser did vote with the majority of member on the Federal Open Market Committee to cut the federal funds rate by 125 basis points over the last two weeks, Wednesday's speech clearly outlines his concerns about inflation bubbling up in the U.S. economy.

- Mike Armstrong

The daily swirl of negative economic statistics and red ink gushing from financial services firms can overwhelm what's going on in other sectors.

Take office furniture. Now there's a business that should be on the edge with a shaky economy. What companies are buying new workstations when they’re considering cutting workers?

Based on the financial results for 2007 for East Greenville-based Knoll Inc. , plenty were.

Knoll surpassed $1 billion in sales last year for the first time. In fact, its sales have grown by 50 percent since 2004 when it went public. And while Knoll CEO Andrew Cogan acknowledged on an analyst call that 2008 will be challenging, the company is better positioned to weather this downturn.

Still investors aren't convinced. Knoll shares are down 41 percent over the last year. Knoll closed Thursday at $13.49, up 73 cents.

"We do not believe the industry is facing anywhere near the conditions that were experienced in 2001-2003," said Barry L. McCabe, Knoll's chief financial officer.

For one thing, Knoll is less dependent on those desks. During the 2001 recession, the company relied on its "office systems" for 70 percent of its revenue. Now that figure is 50 percent.

It also gets 10 percent of its revenue from areas other than North America. Knoll's European business was strong and it doubled business in the Middle East.

It is a global economy after all. Companies that have diversified geographically may be able to skate through the U.S. slowdown with only bumps and bruises.

- Mike Armstrong

New blogger and veteran banker Vernon W. Hill II writes that he voted against the pending $8.5 billion acquisition of Commerce Bancorp Inc. by Toronto-Dominion Bank.

The deal was approved by Commerce shareholders Wednesday afternoon at a meeting at the bank's Commerce University in Mount Laurel at which lots of shareholders aired their concerns over the sale.

Hill, who did not attend the meeting, called the day "bittersweet."

On the one hand, we created a huge amount of value for our shareholders over the years. On the other, the magic of Commerce and the bond among its incredible team members and customers will soon begin to slowly fade away. Nothing, however, can take away our accomplishments and our legacy of reinventing of retail banking.

And he writes that he's been hearing about cost-cutting that Toronto-Dominion is planning "to chip away at the Commerce magic":

As T-D (whether it realizes it or not) transforms Commerce into just another bank, I'm afraid it might lose more in customer goodwill than it picks up in savings.

Hill joined the Bankstocks.com Web site as both a co-chairman and a contributing writer in January. And it doesn't look like this will be his last word on the bank he founded in 1973. The banking blog intends to maintain a "Commerce Watch" on its site.

- Mike Armstrong

After another punishing week for bank and financial stocks, it's somewhat surprising that First Keystone Financial Inc. was the biggest gainer among the Philadelphia-area companies the Inquirer tracks. The Delaware County-based bank reported decent first-quarter earnings, and the market responded nudging its stock price up 14 percent to close at $11.71 on Friday.

On the other hand, more bad news for the new-home building sector put pressure on Bensalem-based Orleans Homebuilders Inc. Shares fell 24 percent as Toll Bros. Inc. and others saw little end to one of the nation's worst housing slumps. Orleans closed at $4.42 Friday.

- Mike Armstrong

It's not quite annual report season, but Exelon Corp. is always one of the first to file its Form 10-K with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

At 434 pages, Exelon's 10-K is required reading for anyone who needs to understand how the Chicago-based power company keeps the lights on.

It's a trove of nuggets such as:

* Exelon had 17,800 employees companywide as of Dec. 31. Of those, 2,300 were employed at its Peco subsidiary. (At the end of 2006, Exelon employed 17,200 people, including 2,100 at Peco.)

* Peco intends to spend $394 million in capital expenditures to add new substations in South Philadelphia and the University City sections as well as to expand substations in Newlinville, Chester County, and Upper Providence, Montgomery County.

* Peco has about 1.6 million electricity customers and 480,000 natural gas customers.
And Exelon expects to spend $731 million for nuclear fuel for the 11 power plants in which owns an interest, such as Limerick in Montgomery County.

- Mike Armstrong

That solid 2007 that Knoll Inc. turned in has led to some plush bonuses for its top management team.

According to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday, CEO Andrew B. Cogan has been awarded a cash bonus of $1.04 million.

Kathleen G. Bradley, president and CEO of Knoll North America, will get a bonus of $780,000, while chief financial officer Barry L. McCabe will get $416,000.

Stephen A. Grover, the executive vice president for operations, and Arthur C. Graves, the executive vice president of sales and distribution, each will receive $416,000.

The East Greenville, Pa.-based office furniture designer and manufacturer topped $1 billion in sales for the first time last year.

- Mike Armstrong

The economic slowdown has exposed the extremes that have defined Americans for years: too much debt, chronic spending and little savings.

The U.S. economy depends a great deal on consumer spending. Repeat after me: Consumption accounts for 70 percent of the $14.08 trillion U.S. economy.

To buy what we want, Americans have taken on massive amounts of debt. We have done so even as our savings have evaporated. No, check that: Even as we have blown it all.

Conventional wisdom says that when money get tight in the household budget, you tighten your belt. But many of us haven't done that. We've taken on more debt. We've charged things on credit cards. We've refinanced the mortgage — two, three, four times. All in the name of delaying that payback.

So along comes the President and Congress with an economic stimulus check for you. What the politicians, economists and Wall Street want you to do is to run to Best Buy (better yet, drive your Hummer there) and buy that plasma TV. Or hit the mall to buy those spring fashions at Macy's.

A story in Sunday's Business section about the growing use of arbitration by doctors in an effort to hold down medical malpractice costs attracted feedback from lawyers and others.

Inquirer staff writer Stacey Burling's story showed how area doctors have been asking patients to sign away their right to a jury trial. Instead, disputes would be handled with binding arbitration outside the court system.

A lawyer with Shrager, Spivey & Sachs in Philadelphia writes on his blog that the article should have included patients who had attempted to sue only to realize they'd signed their rights away.

Ms. Burling should have interviewed a representative of "Give Me Back My Rights," a group funded in part by AARP to raise consumer awareness about the dangers of binding mandatory arbitration.

- Mike Armstrong

Americans have made progress in reducing their addiction to smoking, but very little in cutting their consumption of oil.

Those are reasons enough for the keepers of the Dow Jones Industrial Average to change the makeup of the widely watched stock-market measure.

Gone are Altria Group Inc. and Honeywell International Inc. in favor of Bank of America Corp. and Chevron Corp.

Financials and energy were underrepresented in the Dow, the editors of the Wall Street Journal say. So they are dropping Honeywell - a Dow member since a predecessor joined in 1925 - because at $34.6 billion in sales it is the smallest of the industrials. No room for sentiment in a global economy.

Altria has always been a money machine, but its new, narrow focus - it spun off Kraft Foods in 2007 - doesn't suit the Dow, the Journal says.

The Philadelphia area doesn't lose much representation with the changes. New York-based Altria did buy cigar maker John Middleton Inc., of King of Prussia, for $2.9 billion in the fall. But Bank of America, of Charlotte, N.C., has a big presence locally.

Other Dow components with large operations in the region are Boeing Co., DuPont Co., Johnson & Johnson and Merck & Co. Inc.

- Mike Armstrong

No doubt manufacturing has steadily evaporated here, but Ametek Inc., of Paoli, has been acquiring quite a collection of subsidiaries all over the world.

Ametek could be one of the quietest publicly held $2 billion companies around. Its operations are scattered across 19 states and 10 foreign countries. But occasionally Ametek does a local deal. Yesterday, it bought Newage Testing Instruments Inc. , of Southampton. Unless you're into testing the hardness of metals, Newage is not likely to be familiar.

But it's the kind of company that Ametek seeks out for its customers in the aerospace, industrial, process and power markets. Ametek does have one claim to fame: It boasts that it is the world's largest maker of "air-moving electric motors" for vacuum cleaners.

- Mike Armstrong

In a report, that won't send anyone dancing into the streets, the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia released a survey of professional forecasters that sees "weak growth" for the first half of 2008.

Those surveyed see economic growth of 0.7 percent, rather than the 2.2 percent they projected three months ago, the Fed says.

Guess what? That's not a recession, but weak growth doesn't feel too good either.

The pros are looking for real gross domestic product to grow 1.8 percent in 2008 and 2.9 percent in 2009.

However, the New York Times is looking for recession. David Leonhardt has this analysis, reading between the lines of the Fedspeak:

The recession-probability index — which the Philadelphia Fed calls the Anxious Index — has yet to miss a recession entirely or to signal one that never happened.

- Mike Armstrong

As big as it is, Citigroup Inc. probably does a lot of deals all over the world that barely make a ripple outside of the trade press.

Last month, it bought a small company that has the kind of Philadelphia story we don't hear enough of.

Citigroup acquired a Bala Cynwyd company called PayQuik, which has developed a money transfer system that banks and other financial services firms use to allow customers to transfer money internationally.

PayQuik is focused on remittances, the payments by migrants to families back home - Latin America, India, China, wherever home is. Migrants' options typically are to send the money with someone traveling to their hometown, use a money transfer service such as Western Union or MoneyGram, or go to a bank.

In 2006, 150 million migrants worldwide sent more than $300 billion to their families in developing countries, according to research commissioned by the International Fund for Agricultural Development. One analyst projects that figure could grow to $500 billion by 2010.

Quakertown-based Cellegy Pharmaceuticals Inc. has agreed to be acquired by a California specialty drug developer in a stock transaction.

Adamis Pharmaceuticals Corp. is a privately held firm working on treatments for viral infections, including influenza. Adamis CEO Dennis Carlo will become the head of the combined company.

Carlo is a heavy hitter from the West Coast, having been CEO of Immune Response Corp. and president of Telos Pharmaceuticals.

Cellegy has struggled financially, trying to develop Savvy, a contraceptive gel that has its roots in the West Philadelphia labs of a company called Biosyn.

- Mike Armstrong

It was kind of a surprise to hear a union praise Wal-Mart, especially since the retail giant is generally vilified by the labor movement.

But Ann Kempski, deputy director of legislation for the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), told a group of area human resource executives that the Arkansas retailer deserves at least some points for opening mini-clinics staffed with nurse practitioners in its stores. The inexpensive care will particularly help some of the low-wage workers -- janitors, home health aides, security guards -- that SEIU so often represents.

"I think that these clinics that Wal-Mart is creating have the potential to be an incredibly transformative thing," she said, speaking on a panel put together by Mercer, a human resource consulting firm, at the Four Seasons hotel in Philadelphia this morning. The panel was intended to inform the group about the political landscape for health care reform.

Kempski said that Wal-Mart's program will improve access and "will help drive down costs" through its use of nurse practitioners for some routine care, instead of more-expensive doctors. "We can not produce more doctors," she said.

Almost exactly a year ago, the SEIU and several others partnered with Wal-Mart, AT&T and other major employers in a joint effort to improve health care. When SEIU's president, former Univ. of Penn grad Andrew Stern, stood on the platform with Wal-Mart CEO Lee Scott to announce the program, it was a shock.

In doing so, SEIU broke with an ally, the United Food and Commercial Workers, which has been campaigning hard against the retail giant. Chief among UFCW's complaints has been Wal-Mart's less than stellar performance in providing health insurance for its own employees. Wal-Mart has improved its coverage in the last year, but not enough critics say.

Kempski agreed. "I'm still a critic of Wal-Mart when it comes to benefits for their own employees."

- Jane M. Von Bergen

The Federal Trade Commission late today sued Frazer, Pa.-based Cephalon Inc. over what it called anti-competitive behavior preventing competition to its sleep disorder treatment, Provigil.

Cephalon is paying four generic drug makers to refrain from selling generic versions of Provigil until 2012. It's a practice other pharmaceutical companies have engaged in.

But the FTC says that practice violates the law. It sued Cephalon in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C.

In a news release, the commission's Bureau of Competition Director Jeffrey Schmidt said:

Today's suit against Cephalon seeks to undo a course of anticompetitive conduct that is harming American consumers by depriving them of access to lower-cost generic alternatives to an important branded drug.

Provigil, a treatment for narcolepsy and shift-work sleep disorder, has been a big seller for Cephalon.

- Mike Armstrong

Going "green" isn't a new trend.

Every prolonged spike in the price of crude oil has spurred companies and individuals to try new ways to reduce their use of petroleum whether as a fuel or industrial raw material.

Still, experimentation with non-fossil fuels should be encouraged, especially if you believe that one day every country will be abiding by some carbon emissions cap.

But make no mistake, changing the carbon bootprint of the United States is going to be expensive. If there were a cheap, simple substance to replace oil, it would have been adopted long ago.

The electric power industry says it's willing to ride the green wave, but Exelon Corp. CEO John Rowe gave a speech Tuesday warning about the cost. That's in greenbacks rather than greenfields.

Comcast Corp. will pay its first dividend - a payment totally 25 cents annually.

That's a first for the Philadelphia-based cable television giant. And it's a move long sought by shareholders, especially some of the activist hedge funds that have taken aim at how the company has been managed.

Here's what Comcast CEO Brian Roberts had to say:

With a business model that generates significant cash flow, we are in a position to take advantage of profitable growth opportunities while continuing to return capital to shareholders.

- Mike Armstrong

Board members come and go so often that, unless the change involves a well-known name, few notice.

On Monday, Radnor-based Brandywine Realty Trust announced the resignation of two members of its board of trustees. Brandywine, developer of the prism-like Cira Centre near 30th Street Station, is a real estate investment trust focused on office properties.

Thomas F. August and Michael V. Prentiss stepped down from the board they'd joined little more than two years ago, following Brandywine's acquisition of Dallas-based Prentiss Properties Trust in a $3.3 billion deal.

Brandywine chairman Walter D'Alessio said in a statement that the company wished "Tom and Mike all the best in the future."

But the recent past may have been a different story.

You wouldn't think getting sued by a federal agency for unlawful marketing behavior would be catalyst for a company's shares to rise.

But yesterday Cephalon Inc. shares closed at $61.42, up $3.98, or nearly 7 percent.

That increase in value came less than a day after the Federal Trade Commission sued the biotechnology firm over deals it cut with potential generic drug competitors to forego the making cheaper copies of Cephalon's Provigil sleep-disorder drug until 2012.

Cephalon, in defending both its practice and patent validity for Provigil, had this to say after the FTC took action:

We are disappointed that the FTC has determined to challenge these agreements as we believe they fully comply with both the spirit and letter of the antitrust laws. As importantly, our settlements confer a meaningful benefit to U.S. consumers by providing for the entry of generic modafinil three years early.

Several analysts say that federal government has had little success in changing this industry practice. And it looks like the market agreed on Thursday.

- Mike Armstrong

Remember Exelon Corp.'s John Rowe earlier this week talking about the $400 billion that utilities will have to spend to build power plants that have low-carbon emissions?

Gilbert Masters, a Stanford professor emeritus, gives a good reason why there's some urgency. He says current oil supplies in all nations would last the world for only about 41 years.

Others have predicted the end of petroleum, but Masters actually appears to see signs of hope and would throw some more business to the electric power generation industry. He's bullish on the development and wider adoption of electric-powered vehicles.

Why?

"Electricity is an inexpensive fuel," said Masters who advocates generating electricity for cars from sunlight using photovoltaic technology.

And while you might think that kind of talk only plays well in California, consider that a company that makes a raw material to make solar cells today broke ground to build a new manufacturing plant in Fairless Hills. AE Polysilicon says it would employ 145 people at the factory, which is in a low-tax Keystone Opportunity Improvement Zone.

- Mike Armstrong

The local stock that rose the most among non-penny last week was GMH Communities Trust, of Newtown Square. American Campus Communities Inc., of Austin, Texas, agreed to buy GMH, which ignited the Delaware County company’s shares, which closed Friday at $8.84, up 55.1 percent. Both GMH and American Campus specialize in providing off-campus student housing for colleges and universities.

First Resource Bank, a small Exton bank, saw its shares fall the most. It closed at $5.40, down 16.9 percent. The bank, which has less than $100 million in assets, released its 2007 financial results last Monday. First Resource posted its first annual profit of $650,973 since it opened in May 2005.

Why'd the shares fall then? Maybe it had to do with the $6.5 million decline in deposits during the fourth quarter. The bank did say that its deposits rose $5.7 million in January alone to $75.3 million.

- Mike Armstrong

On Friday, Allied Security Holdings L.L.C., of King of Prussia, signed off on a new employment agreement for its longtime CEO, William C. Whitmore Jr.

Allied Security is one of the nation's largest providers of security guards for shopping malls, office buildings and college campuses. It is 70 percent owned by Ronald Perelman's MacAndrews & Forbes Holdings conglomerate.

Under the new five-year agreement, Whitmore's annual base salary rises from $544,000 to $675,000, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The board's compensation committee will consider increasing that annual salary:

... based on comparisons with salaries of chief executive officers of comparable companies in the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, geographic area, using a four percent increase as a benchmark.

(So, assuming Whitmore were to get a 4 percent increase next year, that would push his salary to $702,000.)

He is also eligible for an annual incentive bonus of 50 percent of his salary.

- Mike Armstrong

Starting Monday, Feb. 18, this blog can be found here on Philly.com's publishing platform. Over time we will restore some of our current features, such as company news releases. But the new spot immediately gives us some better capabilities. It also coincides with the launch of our business news webcast, Philadelphia Business Today on the Business & Money page at Philly.com, with a new video every day.

Our address www.phillyinc.biz has not changed. But for anybody who bookmarks us, the actual URL is now www.philly.com/philly/blogs/phillyinc. See you there.

- PhillyInc editors