Herald and Review from Decatur, Illinois • Page 10

Decatur, Illinois Tuesday, March 31, 1992 IK! AIO IT Jane mm bmiMu 0n jhtth MEj) (0 A 2f uumn Commentary Local restaurants say still business as usual. By BILL RUMiXSKI Staff Writer for Rally's, said Robert Martyn, an analyst with Pauli a St. Louis investment bank. "It's an outstanding acquisition for Rally's and for Zipps," Martyn said. "It's much easier and much less expensive to expand this way than to build this many restaurants." Rally's wants to acquire the 45 Zipps restaurants, including 16 franchised stores, said Donald Moore, Rally's senior vice president and chief financial officer.

"We're very early in the process, but signed a letter of intent for Rally's to acquire Zipps for $12 million. The deal is tentatively set to close May 31. "We're really unsure what this means for us. For the time being it is business as usual," said Joseph Morrissey, the Zipps franchise operator who owns two Zipps in Decatur, one in Peoria and one in Mount Vernon. "This is in the embryonic stages now and we probably won't know too much more until late May," Morrissey said Monday.

The pending sale is "a significant move" obviously we'd like to convert as many Zipps restaurants to Rally's restaurants as we possibly can," Moore said Monday. The company has not yet made any decisions about markets such as Decatur that have both Rally's and Zipps restaurants. "We'll be discussing this with each of the franchise operators," Moore said. Rally's is the largest of the double drive-up chains with 338 restaurants in 22 states, accounting for about 40 percent of the double drive-up hamburger shops operating. About a third are company-owned shops.

Mutuals can prove taxing Rally's Inc. looks to make a quick meal of competitor Zipps Drive-Thru Inc. in the growing market of double drive-up hamburger shops. Louisville, Rally's and its smaller St. Louis-based competitor have Farm sSrow Mimaier ies Dalton City event was his last OSKALOOSA, Iowa Dave Roepke, manager of the 1991 Farm Progress Show near Dalton City, died Sunday in Oskaloosa, Iowa.

He was 26. native, was hospitalized days before the three-day agriculture show opened near Dalton City on Sept. 24. He had been on a medical leave of absence since then from Farm Progress Publications, the show sponsor and publisher of Prairie Farmer magazine. Roepke was diagnosed as having acute lymphatic leukemia at Loyola University Medical Center, Maywood.

He 'received chemotherapy ,5 Stiver ft um Roepke Farm Progress leader ii ,1." 'ft iiiTiiin riilitiiiii fT i '1 treatment for the leukemia, which for a time had been in remission. He joined Farm Progress in 1988 as an assistant show manager and managed shows in West Brooklyn and in Rochester, and Amana, Iowa. Roepke planned to retire as Farm Progress Show manager after the Dalton City event and return to Oskaloosa with his wife, Noelle. He had applied to veterinary school at Iowa State University. AP It looks like you CAN take it with you.

At least, that's the idea of "the Suitcase Car," demonstrated at a trade show in Hiroshima, Japan. After packing your belongings, you can hop on the three-wheel vehicle and motor off at about 18 mph. The Suitcase Car is to be exhibited at New York's Motor Show in May. Funeral arrangements were pending Monday. United Airlines chiefs pay has been symbol for protest.

"Our feeling is most of their marketing thrust went toward the economy he said, leaving larger hotels and resorts in the chain lost in the shuffle. A portion of the savings from dropping By DAVID DISHKEAU AP Business Writer The NEW YORK Mutual funds are wonderfully simple to buy and sell. But at tax time, I wish I'd never heard of them. The system for calculating profits and losses is appallingly complicated, especially for investors who make regular contributions and reinvest dividends and capital gains. If you sell shares, and forget to subtract the cost of the shares you bought through reinvestment (which often happens), you may overpay your tax.

FOR YEARS, I'd been asking mutual funds why they didn't give their customers more help. Finally, there's a light at the end of the tunnel. A handful of mutual funds now provide the information you need to simplify your tax calculation, and Congress may force the rest of the industry to follow. Fund investors have to report the taxable distributions they get from the fund, including taxable dividends and capital gains. You also owe a tax on any profits you earn by selling fund shares for more than you paid.

If you sell for less, you report a loss. Your cost for each share includes the sales commission, if you bought a fund with a load. Every time you put money into a fund including reinvested dividends and capital gains you are buying new shares. As time goes by, you accumulate a huge pile of shares acquired at a wide variety of prices. When you sell shares, then, which ones have you sold? Which cost do you use for figuring your gain or loss? THERE ARE two ways of figuring your cost a (ha ha) simple way and a truly complicated way.

(1) With the (ha ha) simple way, you add up the cost of all your shares, including those bought with reinvested dividends, and divide by the number of shares you own. That's your "average cost." You then compare the selling price with the average cost, to establish your gain or loss. Every time you sell shares during the year, you may have to calculate your average cost all over again. (2) Now comes the truly complicated way of figuring your tax. Each time you sell shares, you specify in a dated letter to the mutual fund exactly which shares you want to dispose of.

For example, "Sell the 100 shares I bought for $8.50 on Jan. 12, 1988." This allows you to sell the specific shares that show losses or only small capital gains, which holds down your tax. IF YCU D0JTT specify which of these two methods you're using, the IRS will assume that you've sold the shares you held the longest. Those are usually the shares with the highest gains, which tends to maximize your tax. Now for the good news.

At least five mutual-fund companies are doing the grunt work of calculating their shareholders' average cost basis (single category method). You just multiply that by the number of shares you sold to get your taxable gain or loss. A provision requiring mutual funds to calculate your average cost was contained in the tax bill just vetoed by the president. The plan will probably be reintroduced. Many funds I spoke with say they're looking into providing average cost voluntarily.

In the meantime, they may send shareholders an abbreviated free tax guide. A good detailed guide costs $5 from the Vanguard Group, Tax Guide, P.O. Box 2700, Valley Forge, 19482. Or get the IRS's free Publication 564, "Mutual Fund Distributions." Jane Bryant Qufan is Newsweek the franchise fee will go into the resort's own marketing efforts, with the emphasis on regional customers. "We've always been fairly aggressive," Barbeau said.

"Now we're looking at more national and regional marketing Eagle Creek managers will focus marketing on regional customers. By JEFFREY RAYMOND Mattoon Bureau Chief FIND LAY It's been business as usual at the Inn at Eagle Creek since managers dropped the resort's affiliation with Clarion Inns. That's why the resort dropped the affiliation in the first place. "The whole point was it made very little difference," said Jim Barbeau, president of the inn. The association with Clarion ended Feb.

29. Resort management dropped the Clarion name from the title, and gave up inclusion in the hotel chain's reservation system. But the resort also gave up paying a franchise fee to Clarion's parent company, Choice Hotels. Last year the inn paid about $100,000 in franchise fees, Barbeau said. In both cases, the executives received no bonuses and realized fewer or no gains from exercising stock options.

Gains from stock options made up the bulk of their 1990 compensation. Neither company acknowledged a link between the lower compensation and the controversy over executive pay that was the subject of a Senate hearing in January and a recently proposed package of Securities and Exchange Commission rule changes. Several other big corporate chiefs took pay cuts or declined bonuses last year but "it's too early to tell whether it's a broad-based trend," said Ralph Whitworth, president of Washington-based United Shareholders Association, a shareholder advocacy group. UAL agreed to a demand from Whitworth's group earlier this year that the company provide in its proxy materials a clear explanation of compensation packages, including a breakdown of salary, bonus, stock options and other stock plans. The rule changes proposed last month by SEC Chairman Richard Breeden would require all companies to provide such information to shareholders.

whole point was it made very little Jim Barbeau President Clarion Inn CHICAGO United Airlines Chairman Stephen M. Wolf took a 97 percent pay cut in 1991, earning a relatively meager $575,000, after his $18.3 million compensation the year before became a lightning rod for criticism of high executive salaries. Wolf's 1991 wages, and those of other UAL Corp. executives, were detailed in proxy materials that United's parent began mailing to shareholders Monday. The company, which lost $331.9 million in 1991, said executive compensation is linked to its performance, but it did not cite any factors behind the drop in Wolf's pay.

Waste Management another large Chicago-area company, also began mailing proxy statements Monday that showed its chairman pocketed substantially less in 1991 than the previous year. Dean L. Buntrock received $3.7 million, compared with $12.3 million in 1990. than we did in the past." It's still a bit too early to tell how the inn's independent status will pay off in the spring and summer season. Barbeau predicted that it is "not going to make a negative impact." New York stocks PE.

Sales. Last. Chg. Amertech 13 1650 1.32 103 22428 41 NYSE issues consolidated trading March 30, 1992 7t 18 9160 d42 16 5302 27 Amoco 2.20 ArchDn AtlRich 5.50 Metals Volume in shares 168,568,680 Issues traded 2,236 NEW YORK (AP) Spot commodity prices (Wholesale): Boeing 1 Prev. Year CilCorp Today Day Ago CIPSCOl.88 Aluminum, cents per pound, LME 58.8 58.0 65.0 Caterp .60 Antimony, American per lb 1.25-1.40 1.25-1.40 2.00 Chryslr .60 Copper, Electrolytic per lb 1.1315 1.1320 1.1840 CmwE 3 Gold, troy oz.

Handy Harman 343.30 340.50 358.70 Deere 2 Silver, troy oz. Handy Harman 4.120 4.105 3.945 DetEd 1.98 Lead, per lb 35 .35 .33 DoWCh 2.60 Palladium NY Merc spot per troy oz. 85.15 85.10 91.85 DuPont 1.68 Pig Iron, b. fdry Buttalo gross ton 213.00 213 00 213.00 Exxon 2.68 Platinum, troy oz. N.Y.

(contract) 345-347 345 347 384-390 FirstAmer Platinum NY Merc spot per troy oz. 351.10 352.50 391.10 FordM 1.60 Mercury, 76 lb flask N.Y. 175-185 175 185 145-150 GTE 1.70 Scrap Steel, gross ton, Pitts. 84 83 84 83 105.17 GenEI 2.20 Tin, Metals Week composite lb. 3.7900 3.7743 3.5670 GnMotr 1 60 Zinc, per lb Gdrich 2.20 99' 43 36' 27' '4 50B 9 17) V2 34 Vb 51 Vs Vs 30 '4 47'A 55 30' 38 30 'A 76 Vs 36 50V Vb 65 'a V.

64' Up 712 Unchanged 6C2 Down 922 23 2017 10 5350 12 46 13 151 2072 11543 427 1594 32 704 8 885 14 3969 17 6510 12 6486 9 224 7310 18 8889 15 6011 8684 35 603 50 1512 10 815 20 1074 12 13505 20 1173 13 2769 8 565 16 1174 21 41 29 192 13 6291 NYSE Index 222.99 Down 0.32 Goodyr .40 Composite 403.00 Down 0.50 Vb Vb 21 83H 73 'b a 52 Dow Jones Industrials 3,235.24 Up 3.80 31 V4 Grain futures Futures trading on the Chicago Board of Trade Monday Open. Chg. WHEAT May 3.83V 3.87 3.77 3.83' .01 Jul 3.61 3.65VH 3.58'A 3.63Mi .02 Livestock futures Futures trading on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange Monday Chg. CATTLE Over the Counter 17H 26 37 'A 59 'A 65' 3 Vb 59 59 63' Apr 77.60 3.66 3.69V2 3.62V 3.68 .03 3.74Vi 3.78 3.71 3.76 Vi 28 754 3434 17 2412 31 636 20 1521 Bid 13Vj 2 78.50 74.80 70.00 70.10 70.35 69.60 77.42 73.70 69.12 69.35 69.80 69.35 3.77 3.78' 3.75 3.77' Sep Dec Mar May Jul LinBrdcst MagnaGr Akorn annual meeting. Cassida, formerly vice president, also has served as chairman of the Cashford Farm Youth Foundation Board and is vice chairman of the Illinois Agricultural Auditing Association.

David Albin of Newman was elected Farm Bureau vice president. Cassida succeeds Larry Harbaugh, who retired after four years as Farm Bureau president. Rising rates slow sales of homes WASHINGTON (AP) Rising mortgage rates and uncertainty over a proposed new tax credit for first-time purchase helped home sales fall 2.7 percent in February, analysts said. But few analysts felt the housing sector recovery was in any danger of faltering. The industry traditionally leads the economy out of recession.

unions launch contract talks WASHINGTON (AP) American Telephone and Telegraph Co. and its two unions opened contract talks with labor leaders who say the big fight would be over the elimination of union-protected jobs. Board Chairman Robert E. Allen said Monday the company's main concern was flexibility to manage its workforce to stay competitive with non-unionized Jun Aug Oct Dec Feb .25 .02 .15 .15 .15 .03 .02 78.35 74.52 69.55 69.72 70.00 69.42 70.52 73.75 69.30 69.50 69.95 69.35 Effingham company will build in Israel EFFINGHAM National Building Systems will provide $1.4 million worth of housing for Russian immigrants in Israel, the company announced. The Effingham-based builder has contracted to supply materials to build 99 duplexes in Dimona, Israel, with the Israeli Ministry of Housing.

The project, to run from April to June, will create 198 residential units. "We are pleased to have the opportunity to participate as a supplier in this Israeli effort to house the immigrants. (And) Future projects are in the making," said National Building President L.W. McKenzie Jr. More interest rate reductions doubted WASHINGTON (AP) The Federal Reserve is unlikely to cut interest rates further, despite pressure from the Bush administration, private analysts say.

If the analysts' prediction Monday is true, it would mean that interest rates, including the benchmark prime rate and mortgage lending rates, have probably seen their lows for this year. Douglas Farm Bureau chooses leaders TUSCOLA Jerry Cassida, a Villa Grove farmer, was elected president of the Douglas County Farm Bureau at the organization's Ask 75'i 137B 31-16 32' 11 ITT Cp 1.84 IHPowr IBM 4.84 IntPap 1.68 mart 1.76 Kemper Kroger LeeEnt .76 Mead 1 Mobil 3 20 Monsan 2.08 Navistr NflkSo 1.80 PPG 1.84 Penney 2.64 ProctG 2 Quantm RalsPu 1.20 Rockwl .92 Sears 2 Texaco 3.20 UALCp UCarb 1 UnElec Unisys Upjohn 1.36 Walgrns WalMt .21 WstgEI .72 Whrlpl 1.10 3.64 3.43 3.43 3.42 3.43 i ah 4- nnv Sep 70.60 70.70 70.52 Apr sales 8,556 open int 58,011 Fastenal 32 Biosys 10'A sales 13,972 open int 96,904 FEEDER CATTLE Apr 78.40 79.60 78 40 79.45 78 00 76.37 May 77 10 75.55 20 3129 100'B Vb 1505 1318 15 483 50' 9 4334 d23'2 "A 12 3761 45'n Vi 12 4678 567 1530 141' 2'4 15 1600 24H 11 1225 32' V. 4514 9 Vb 13 4246 d37V4 22 842 35 38 6592 53 'A 10 4589 18' IB 1347 44 Vb 77.00 75.47 74.90 74.60 78 35 76.50 75.50 75.25 75.30 Aug Sep Oct 75.40 74.77 75.15 74.90 74.70 74.85 74.85 Nov Grain markets Decatur area prices Thursday, supplied by ADM Growmark-Tebor Corn S2.59V4 Beans J5.68V Wheat .41 sales 1,315 open int HOGS 39.50 .55 .40 .32 .18 .13 .07 11,822 .77 1.02 1.50 1.50 1.25 .82 .85 .60 29,988 Apr 39.85 44.25 43.62 42.15 39.90 43.20 44.15 39.50 43.85 43.62 42.15 39.70 42.55 43.70 44.00 43.62 42.30 39.95 42.60 40.17 44.75 43.97 42.40 40.07 43.35 44.35 42 30 Jun Jul Aug Oct Dec Feb CORN May 2.70V4 2.70V4 2.66 2.66V Jul 2.75Vi 2. 75' 2.71 2.71 Vi Sep 2.671 2.68 2.64 2.64'4 .03 Dec 2.64V 2.64V 2.60V 2.60 .03 'A Mar 2.71 2.71 'A 2.68 2.68'A May 2.75V 2.75V4 2.72 2.72' .03 Jul 2.76 2.76 2.75 2.75 .03 sales 19,723 open Int 281,041 OATS May 1.49 1.50V4 1.48 1.50V Jul 1.54' 1.56V4 1.54 1.56V .02 Sep 1.59 1.60V 1.58' 1.60' .01 Dec 1.64' 1.67 1.64V 1.67 .02 Mar 1.72'- .01 May 1.76V .0214 sales 561 open int 15,447 SOYBEANS May 5 85' 5.88V 5.84Vi 5 85 Jul 5.94 5.97 5.92 5.94 .01 Aug 5.98V4 6.02V 5.97 5.98 .00 Sep 6.02 6.05' 6.02 6.02V .01 'A Nov 6.10V 6.13 6.09 6.10 .01 Jan 6.19 6.22V 6.18 6.19V .01 Mar 6.27V 6.30' 6.27V 6.28 .01 May 6.36 6.36 6.35 6.36 Jul 6.41 6.41 6.40 6.40V .00 'l sales 25,000 open int n.a. 43.95 42.00 42.20 42.00 Apr sales 7,650 open int Hogs Volume East St.

Louis 2,200 Peoria 1.300 Interior mod. PORK BELLIES Top S39.50 $38.50 $40.00 Stock sales are In a also extra new 52-week low split or 25 percent stock dividend, past 12 months paid in stock new 52-week high trading ex-dividend American stocks Issues of area interest, provided by Stifel. Nicolaus Co. PE Sales Last Chg. PrattL 19 21 16 'A Wang 9558 5s May 34.32 34.32 Jul 34.32 35.05 33.65 45.85 45.20 34.32 35.05 33 65 45.85 45 20 2.00 2.00 2.00 2 00 2 00 2.00 35 05 33.80 45.85 45.20 35.05 33 65 45 85 45 20 Aug Feb Mar Cattle 46.60 48.50 46.60 May I magazine's businesseconomics edi- tor.

Her column appears in the i Herald Review on Tuesdays and Thursdays. S76.00 S76.50 East St. Louis 450 Peoria 1,000 sales 2,201 open int 10,938.