Archive for July 2nd, 2008

More than two decades ago, Fortune wrote admiringly about Chrysler's Dick Dauch, the muscle-bound manufacturing boss who was pounding his factories into industry-leading shape. His bruising leadership style seemed perfectly suited to a company filled with similarly high-profile executives bearing names like Iacocca and Lutz.

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Maybe traders really want to get to the beach. How else to explain the action on Wall Street this week?

The adjectives most corporate executives use to describe their ideal offices often include terms like "functional" and "light-filled." But when Lamborghini set out to redo its design studio a few years ago, the list was somewhat more ambitious: It needed to mirror the brand's core values: "extreme, aggressive, sensuous, Italian, uncompromising, exclusive, and challenging."

Stocks turn mixed late Wednesday morning as investors weighed volatile oil prices, a weaker dollar and economic reports that showed improved factory orders and worse private sector employment.

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Oil prices fluctuated Wednesday after the government reported that the nation's crude supplies fell slightly more than expected last week while stockpiles of gasoline unexpectedly rose.

While nobody needs a two-and-a-half ton sport utility vehicle that gets to 100 mph in 15 seconds, it is possible to rationalize the purchase of a Cayenne. Think of it as the family man's Porsche.

Imagine being able to convert water into a boundless source of cheap energy. That's what BlackLight Power, a 25-employee firm in Cranbury, N.J., says it can do. The only problem: Most scientists say that company's technology violates the basic laws of physics.

Stocks inched higher early Wednesday morning as investors kept an eye on seesawing oil prices ahead of the government's weekly supply report and the May reading on factory orders.