The Boston Globe from Boston, Massachusetts • 56

'i ly 56 THE BOSTON GLOHK MONDAY, JANUARY 1, Trump, for once, is a big loser Mutual funds see more growth in ri'iiKiriKMWMWM i ii i i i ----niiMi im -r-T- iiimimT AND HAPPY NEW YEAR, celebrate the end of 1989. TOO: Tokyo traders applaud as they jam the floor of the The market reopens on Wednesday. Tokyo Stock Exchange to IMWresume strike It was not clear if there was progress to halt the bitter strike. Pittston, ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON Talks resumed yesterday between the United Mine Workers and the Pittston Co. to end a 9-month strike that has idled coal miners in three states.

Herb Fishgold, an aide to mediator W. J. Usery, said the negotiations at a Washington hotel ran into the early morning yesterday and started again about 10 a.m. It is the fifth day of marathon bargaining that began after a Christmas break. Both sides are under a gag order imposed by Usery and it was not clear if there was progress to halt By Rose Ragsdale BALTIMORE SUN Though mutual funds grew and spread in the 1980s like wildfire, experts say that the industry can expect more of the same in the 1990s as these increasingly popular investments tailor themselves more and more to meet individual investor needs.

"We're entering a real period of creativity," says Betty K. Hart, a spokeswoman for the Investment Company Institute in Washington. "There will be growth in specialized funds and sector funds. In fact opportunities are being created along every point of the risk spectrum." Hart said that the phenomenal popularity of money market funds in the 1980s has fueled much of the industry's overall growth in the decade. For example, money market funds made up 48 percent of the $94.5 billion in assets held by the x' mutual fund industry in 1979.

Ten years later, money market and tax-free money market funds have kept pace, accounting for 44.4 percent of the industry's $962.6 billion in total assets. Yet the number of stock and bond-income funds in the United States has grown fivefold in the past decade, to 2,255 this year compared with 448 in 1979. Long-term mutual fund assets also skyrocketed during the 10-year period, from $49 billion at the end of 1979 to $534.9 billion in October. Though the stock market has risen phenomenally in recent years; mutual funds in the 1980s may be more noted for growth in volume than for appreciation in value. The Dow average of 30 industrial stocks climbed 28.21 percent in the first three quarters of 1989 and 172.26 percent over the past five years, according to Lipper Analytical Services.

But managers of broad-based stock funds haven't kept up. On average, general equity funds rose 25.42 percent in the January-September stretch a huge gain, but almost three points less than the Dow. Over the five-year stretch, the gap widens to nearly 60 percentage points, 113.6 percent for funds vs. the Dows 172.26 percent Yet total mutual fund assets, which started the decade at $94.5 bil- lion, may exceed $1 trillion this month, ICI officials say. talks more than $100 million, giving striking workers about $200 a week to live on, plus a Christmas bonus.

Miners normally earn up to $635 a week. The union also is facing fines of $63.5 million for violating court orders limiting picketing and other strike activities. Pittston hired replacement workers, but production has been well below pre-strike levels. The company reported its coal operations lost $3.6 million in the second quarter of 1989 and $9.8 million in the third quarter, compared with profits of $9 million and $7.4 million in the respective quarters of 1988. Transport Association, an industry trade group.

Robin Mattel, spokesman for Continental's sister airline, Eastern Airlines, said a possible fuel surcharge was under study. A fuel surcharge is also one option under consideration at United Airlines, said spokesman Joe Hopkins. Don Morrison, a spokesman for Trans World Airlines, said a fare increase was possible if fuel prices continued to rise, but he said the airline was not considering a surcharge. Delta Air Lines, American Airlines and USAir said they were not studying a surcharge or a fare Some airlines consider fuel surcharge the bitter strike by some 1,700 coal miners in West Virginia, Virginia and Kentucky. Usery, a former labor secretary, had said he hoped to reach a tentative settlement by New Year's Day.

The union workers staged the strike in April after Pittston decided to end contributions to the UMW retirement and health plans for some 130,000 workers. The union said the decision could cause other coal companies to follow suit and retired miners would lose their benefits. Pittston, the nation's largest coal exporter, says it cannot afford the payments because it faces high costs months. Airlines speculated that calling a fuel-related fare increase a surcharge might make it more palatable to consumers. Several airlines said they were concerned about the jump in fuel prices, which are up 40 percent from a year ago.

Spot prices of jet fuel in New York have soared 70 percent this month, caused in part by Gulf Coast refinery fires and an Eastern cold snap that have strained oil supplies. "The price of fuel has been going crazy," said Art Kent spokesman for Continental Airlines. "It is a serious problem. We are looking at a num LOS ANGELES TIMES Donald Trump, for a change, came away a loser this Christmas. Joe DiMaggio struck out And Pee-wee Herman had little to giggle about Merchandise that was, in one way or another, linked to their names apparently ranked among the bigger disappointments this holiday gift-giving season.

Solid sales figures aren't available yet But it's clear that even though many manufacturers and retailers narrowed their losses by taking fewer chances on imaginative new products, they still came up with some flops that gathered dust on store shelves. Retail industry observers said some of the bombs were products that relied on simple gimmickry or, perhaps, little more than the notoriety of the people associated with them. "Trump: The Game" suffered from its somewhat misleading image as a clone of the longtime favorite board game "Monopoly." But even more damaging, analysts said, was the. public's apparent growing disen-, chantment with the real estate baron Janelle Berger, assistant manager of the Toys International store Jfca Glendale, said the Trump eventually sold out at her store. But, she said, it start moving until it was marked down from $40 to $29, and a sign was put up indicating that Trump's proceeds would go to charity.

Consumers weren't turned on by entertainer Pee-wee Herman, either. A line of children's clothing he promoted for J.C. Penney stores reportedly fizzled. I Women didn't want to look like Hie-back of a horse," said one analyst. Many other goods that were labeled mild disappointments sold reasonably well but failed to meet store "owners' overblown expectations.

For example, Game Boy, the much bally-jiooed hand-held video game from sold out at many stores tut never generated the hysteria that some retailers anticipated when word came out earlier this year that supplies would be limited. Although the regular Nintendo igame and other video goods regained popular, retailers said shop- irs otherwise turned away from igh-tech and electric toys in favor of more traditional products such as 'dolls and action figures. Magazine I- -Continued from Page 55 grip on the US market estimated at 80 percent in the US by Nintendo, their intense quality control and their strategy of preventing an oversupply of game cartridges has kept sales and consumer interest high. Murphy admits his group already had a presence, although a small one, in the "games" publish-ving business: They publish the quarterly PCGames, for the personal computer; AmigaWorld, for the Amiga computer, inCider, for the Apple II; and Run, for the Commodore 64 computer. Although the three latter magazines are for spe-' cific computers, those computers "are generally used at home and include plenty of advertising and articles on computer games, Murphy said.

-1 "Also we had been talking to Nintendo about setting up a contract publishing business," Murphy said, with IDG publishing the Japanese firm's glossy subscription-based magazine Nintendo Power. Nintendo eventually decided to pro-duce the magazine with another 'company. Nintendo Power currently has an estimated bimonthly tion of "between one and two mil-lion," according to a company -spokesman. The magazine's circulation is not audited, At about the same time, Murphy's group commissioned several focus groups of Nintendo users, generally young boys between the ages of 10-15. Through the groups he discovered yet another aspect of yoJSng video game cons(umers: they're rabid.

Another insurance policy video game users to ship its coal overseas. The UMW also said job security was threatened because Pittston had refused to go along with an industry agreement to give laid-off workers the first chance at new job openings. The UMW raised a strike fund of ber of options; obviously a fuel surcharge is one of them." The increase in jet fuel prices already has prompted two airlines -Trump Shuttle and Pan American World Airways to raise fares on their Northeastern shuttles by 20 percent, starting Wednesday. However, Pan Am said it isn't considering a fare increase on its other, more competitive routes. The cost of fuel has a direct impact on profits, because fuel accounts for about 15 percent of an airline's operating costs.

A 1 cent rise in fuel prices costs the industry $150 million a year, according to the Air PCGames, a magazine for the once-hot PC-based game market PC Games' January issues contained 70 advertising pages. Although the corporate headquarters and some sales activity for the two magazines are handled out of Peterborough, the two magazines are now put together in California. On the strength of the shot in the arm from GamePro and PC Games, the Peterborough group estimates revenues will jump to $40 million in 1990, up from $30 million in 1989. Although reticent to discuss financial details of GamePro, Murphy said he expects GamePro to become profitable in 1990, a not insignificant achievement Wary of jumping too fast into a new marketplace, IDGPeterborough does not want to repeat the mistakes it made with CD-ROM Review, a magazine targeted for the computer market involving optical disk storage for computers. Seen as the new wave of data storage technology in the mid-1980s, its widespread implementation has been slow.

"You don't want to be too much of a pioneer," McBrian said. After two years, CD ROM Review was shut down as a magazine whose time had not come. "We learned out lessons," he said. It is too early to tell whether other high-tech publishers will start sniffing around for nontraditional high tech-like ideas. But Murphy and McBrian hope to ride piggyback on the millions of video game cartridges currently sitting in American homes and take high-tech publishing to a new if sligiytly unusual level.

LOS ANGELES TIMES Several airlines, including United and Continental, said they were considering placing surcharges on tickets to cover recent sharp rises in jet fuel costs. If imposed, the special fuel charges would be the first since the oil crisis of the early 1970s. It wasn't clear whether the airlines would decide to impose the special charges and thus raise ticket prices after reducing fares earlier this week. Most of the nation's airlines have dropped excursion fares by as much as 30 percent to help fill planes during the slow winter aimed at "Some of the kids in the focus groups even knew what time and day the Toys 'R' Us trucks delivered the latest copies of Super Mario Bros. 2 to the stores," Murphy said, still somewhat incredulous.

IDG Group publisher James McBrian is only slightly less amazed at the fervor of the Nintendo kids, preferring the longer view of consumer history. "In 1954 the biggest selling toy was the Lionel train," he said. "You can see the progression of electronic toys." McBrian said the focus groups also tended to debunk a certain adult myths of video game playing. "It turned out that Nintendo playing is a lot more social than we thought" he said. "Kids got together in groups to go one-on-one, or they challenged each other it is a kind of social culture.

It turned out that that fear that kids would go home and play Nintendo for hours all alone was unfounded." McBrian said adults "tend to be solo players." In March a new publication from Redwood City, burst on the scene called GamePro. It was targeted at video game players -primarily boys and sported high-quality graphics, tips and strategies for playing some of the popular cartridge games, including Nintendo, Sega, and Atari. The magazine used full-color, action illustrations and eye-catching action covers. When the new publishers circulated a business plan for additional financing, Murphy and McBrian started negotiations with the owners and consummated a deal before their second issue. For adults who candot fathom whv or how these eames consume BPLUS Continued from Page 55 variables that affect prices very differently.

These include your age, the amount of coverage you choose, and the number of days in a nursing home you decide to pay for yourself. This last variable is known as the elimination period and is similar to the deductible on a homeowners or automobile policy. The most common elimination periods are 20 days and 100 days. Since the average nursing home in Massachusetts costs about $100 a day, you could cut the premium by setting aside $2,000 if you have it to pay for the first 20 days of care. At John Hancock, for example, the premiums for a 65-year-old range from $566 a year to $3,065, says vice president Gail Schaeffer.

Someone choosing a 20-day elimination period and selecting among other variables would pay about $1,588, she says. You can also reduce the premium by not using insurance to cover the entire $100-a-day charge. If you can afford it you might pay $20 or $30 a day yourself and only buy insurance for the rest STATES NEWS SERVICE WASHINGTON The federal government announced the following product recalls this week. This list includes products distributed in New England and nationally. Contumw products Toyo Industrial, in Taipei, Taiw an recalled more than a million "string to string" miniature Christmas light sets which may present a As insurance companies get more experience in writing these policies and seeing how they are used, they are certain to make changes.

Also, some of the companies still waiting for approval from the state may have superior products. That doesn't mean you should wait for them. "These policies are going to change," Pulitano says. They'll probably change every 6 to 18 months." So anyone buying this coverage now, he says, should choose a company that offers automatic upgrades to make sure any improvements are applied to existing policies. Comparing the policies takes time, Slafsky says.

He sometimes works with a customer for four or five months from the first interview until the purchase of the policy, although it can be done in a few weeks. "But if any agent tries to tell you that you've got to sign up for any policy next week," he says, "throw him out" Got a question? Write to Thomas Watterson, "50 Plus," Business See-tion, The Boston Globe, Boston, Mass. 02107. shock or electrocution hazard. Strings of Christmas lights have Toyo" and TP-6" imprinted on the end of the female connector located at the end of the light set Consumers who have Christmas lights with TP-6" connectors should call Toyo toll-free at 1-800-545-8330 from 8 a.m.

to 5 p.m. to obtain a free shipping container to return the recalled light sets. The light sets will be repaired or replaced and returned free-of-charge by the company. so much of a child's time, GamePro is not for them. It includes slickly illustrated game reviews and tips on how to beat the games.

A recent issue offered the following "Protip" on Nintendo's Double Dragon game: "Keep an eye out for enemies tossing dynamite. Once they throw it back away quickly so it hits the floor and not you. Before the TNT explodes, lead the enemy into it so it kills him when it goes off." Players are also encouraged to qualify for the ProChallenge Board, where they must show proof of a top score by photographing or videotaping their video screen showing their top score in a particular game. GamePro lists the verified game players and their top scores. The magazine offers only modest information on the video game dustry and the latest technologies.

GamePro currently claims a monthly circulation of 300,000, with 200,000 of those issues sold over the counter at newsstands, 35,000 sold through bookstores, 75,000 sold through toy stores and about 6,000 through subscriptions, according to McBrian. The magazine's circulation is not audited, but they anticipate applying for a certified audit in 1990, he said. The January issue of GamePro included 50 pages of advertising. With an over-the-counter price of $3.95 and a top published advertising rate of $6,000 per full-page, the revenue potential even discounted is obvious. Potential advertisers include game cartridge developers and hardware suppliers.

IDGPeterborough was so excited about the professionalism of the GamePro staff, that they turned over another of their flecfging books to them, a quarterly called.