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The Justice Department, which earlier this year sued Ameren Missouri over alleged air violations at the Rush Island power plant, is raising the stakes in its case against the utility.

The government amended its complaint against St. Louis-based Ameren, citing additional violations of clean air laws intended to protect public health.

The amended lawsuit, filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in St. Louis, includes two additional claims of Clean Air Act violations at the 1,200-megawatt Rush Island plant in Jefferson County related to construction projects in 2007 and 2010.

The updated lawsuit claims Ameren failed to get needed permits for major modifications at the plant, including the replacement of major boiler components at both Rush Island operating units.

The original lawsuit in January likewise accuses Ameren of doing work in 2001 and 2003 without the required permits.

According to the EPA, the multimillion-dollar modifications resulted in “significant net increases sulfur dioxide emissions,” at least partly because the new equipment makes the plant less prone to break down. That means it can operate more hours in a year, which translates into additional tons of coal being burned and more pollution emitted.

Ameren has denied the government’s allegations and is seeking to dismiss the original lawsuit. The EPA action also raised the ire of U.S. Sen. Roy Blunt, who believes it’s part of a broader attack on coal by the Obama administration.

The utility didn’t immediately respond to questions about the government’s new allegations.

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U.S. stock futures are pointing to a slight rebound from last week’s losses as traders await a report on American consumers’ finances and monitor Europe’s efforts to address its ongoing debt crisis.

The government will report at 8:30 a.m. Eastern on how much money consumers made and spent in May. Economists expect spending was roughly flat after rising 0.4 percent in April. Consumers account for 70 percent of economic activity.

In Europe, Greek lawmakers are debating austerity measures that must pass before the country can receive another bailout to avoid defaulting on its debts no fax needed payday loans.

Dow Jones industrial average futures are up 22, or 0.2 percent, at 11,903. Standard & Poor’s 500 futures are up 3, or 0.3 percent, at 1,267. Nasdaq 100 futures are up 8, or 0.3 percent, at 2,215.

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U.S. stocks fell early Friday, weighed down by weak earnings from two major technology companies.

Shares of Micron Technology Inc. fell 14 percent after the company said weak sales of computer chips hurt its earnings, which were far less than analysts had expected. Oracle Corp. fell 4 percent after its sales of computer hardware fell sharply.

Technology stocks were broadly lower. Micron had the biggest loss of any stock in the Standard & Poor’s 500 index. Cisco Systems Inc. fell 1.3 percent, while Microsoft Corp. lost 1 percent.

Drug company Pfizer Inc. dropped 1 percent after the government rejected its application to sell a new pain drug.

The Dow Jones industrial average fell 95, or 0.8 percent, to 11,952 in morning trading. The S&P 500 dropped 10, also 0.8 percent, to 1,273. The Nasdaq composite index fell 25, or 0.9 percent, to 2,662.

The poor reports from technology companies outweighed a slight improvement in first-quarter U.S. economic growth. Earlier Friday the government reported that the economy grew at an anemic 1.9 percent annual rate during the first three months of the year free 3-in-1 credit report. The number edged up from an earlier estimate of 1.8 percent, but still reflects weak growth. Economists expect little improvement in the second quarter, which ends next week.

The government also reported that businesses increased their orders of long-lasting goods by 1.9 percent in May after a sharp decline in April. Businesses ordered more machinery, equipment and airplanes.

The U.S. economic recovery has cooled since late April, pulling the stock market down in six out of the past seven weeks. Recent reports on housing, employment, manufacturing and retail sales have all been weak. The debt crisis in Greece and fears that China’s growth is slowing have also pushed markets lower.

Newell Rubbermaid Inc. rose 2 percent after the company late Thursday named Unilever executive Michael Polk CEO. Polk has been on Newell’s board of directors since 2009. Analysts applauded the choice.

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Possible cracks emerged in NATO’s Libya air campaign Wednesday as Italy expressed concern about the accidental killing of civilians and called for a suspension in hostilities to allow the delivery of humanitarian aid. However, Britain insisted the alliance was “holding strong.”

Skepticism over the military campaign is growing as weeks of airstrikes have failed to unseat Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi and outrage rises over allegations that airstrikes have caused civilian casualties.

The air campaign continued Wednesday. At least two explosions shook Tripoli before noon as fighter jets soared overhead. It wasn’t immediately clear what had been hit or if there were casualties.

In Rome, the Italian foreign minister called for a suspension in fighting so aid corridors could be set up.

“The humanitarian end of military operations is essential to allow for immediate aid,” including in areas around Tripoli and the rebel stronghold of Misrata, Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said.

Frattini also expressed concern over civilian casualties, referring to “dramatic errors” in the bombing campaign.

“With regard to NATO, it is opportune to ask for more detailed information on results” in the attacks, he said in comments to a parliamentary commission.

Italy is Libya’s former colonial ruler and maintains strong commercial ties to the country. Italy is participating in the NATO-led campaign by allowing use of its air bases to coalition partners and its own aircraft for missions.

Frattini’s comments come three days after Premier Silvio Berlusconi’s key political ally, Northern League leader Umberto Bossi, called for an end to Italy’s participation in the Libyan war.

The League, which is heavily anti-immigrant, has been vehemently opposed to the war because of fears it would unleash waves of refugees on Italy’s shores. Some 20,000 people have arrived in Italy in recent months following unrest in Libya and Tunisia.

A coalition including France, Britain and the United States began striking Gadhafi’s forces under a United Nations resolution to protect civilians on March 19. NATO assumed control of the air campaign over Libya on March 31. It’s joined by a number of Arab allies.

In London, British Prime Minister David Cameron insisted that the NATO-led alliance was “holding strong,” and would complete its task in Libya.

“When you look at what’s happening in Libya, where you see a strengthening of the revolt in the west of Libya, you see more people deserting Gadhafi’s regime,” Cameron told lawmakers in the House of Commons. “You see growing unpopularity in his regime and indeed our coalition holding strong, I think time is on our side, the pressure is growing and I believe we will take it to a satisfactory conclusion.”

Cameron’s office said Britain would not support Frattini’s call for a halt to the air campaign to allow access for humanitarian aid.

“We are very clear that the right approach at the current time is to increase the pressure on Gadhafi’s regime,” Cameron’s spokesman Steve Field told reporters. He said there was no evidence that aid wasn’t reaching civilians.

Britain fears that any pause in the campaign could allow Gadhafi’s forces to regroup and launch new offensives against civilians.

Despite questions raised over the impact of the campaign on stretched defense resources, and worries over civilian casualties, Cameron said the U.K. was “capable of keeping up this operation for as long as it takes.”

The Libyan regime has accused the alliance of targeting civilians _ a charge NATO rejects.

NATO acknowledged it may have struck a residential building and caused civilian casualties in Tripoli earlier this week. It also hammered a compound belonging to a close Gadhafi associate, Khoweildi al-Hamidi, and killed what Libya says was 19 people, including at least three children. NATO called that target a “command and control” center and said it regrets any civilian deaths caused by the strike.

More than a thousand mourners gathered near the compound outside the town of Surman, some 40 miles (60 kilometers) west of Tripoli on Wednesday to bury those killed in Monday’s intense bombing. Al-Hamidi attended the funeral, carrying aloft framed portraits of two grandchildren killed in the strike.

“People are feeling very bitter, angry and sad that this had to happen in the first place,” Libyan government spokesman Moussa Ibrahim told reporters at the funeral. “This conflict has to come to an end immediately.”

Rebels fighting Gadhafi’s forces have taken over much of the eastern half of the country. They also control pockets in the west, including the vital port city of Misrata, about 125 miles (200 kilometers) from Tripoli.

Rebel forces facing barrages of rockets and mortars launched by government troops are trying to push their front line forward from Misrata toward the capital. But an increased number of rockets have been hitting closer to Misrata this week, raising fears among rebels of a renewed push by Gadhafi’s forces toward the city.

After nightfall, Grad rockets fired by Gadhafi forces slammed into a residential area of Misrata. There was no immediate word of casualties.

A hospital official said Wednesday that two people had been killed and two wounded in fighting in Dafniya, some 15 miles (25 kilometers) west of Misrata. Three rockets also struck near the port east of Misrata, but they hit a field and caused no injuries.

The rebels appear to be attracting more international support.

China told Libyan rebel leader Mahmoud Jibril on Wednesday that his Transitional National Council represents a growing segment of the Libyan public and is becoming a major political force in the country.

The comments by Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi were the country’s strongest endorsement yet of the rebel council. Beijing, an important business partner with Libya, says it isn’t taking sides in the more than 4-month-old conflict.

Also on Wednesday, Danish Foreign Minister Lene Espersen made a surprise visit to the rebels’ de facto capital of Benghazi in eastern Libya to offer support for the rebels’ transitional government.

“We recognize the National Transitional Council through the transitional period,” she told reporters. “The Danish parliament wants to continue support of the Libyan cause and that is including military support and the political help including recognizing the NTC.”

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Fewer people bought previously occupied homes in May, lowering sales to their weakest point of the year.

Home sales sank 3.8 percent last month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.81 million homes, the National Association of Realtors said Tuesday. That’s far below the roughly 6 million annual sales rate typical in healthy housing markets.

Since the housing boom went bust in 2006, sales have fallen in four of the past five years. Analysts say they expect sales to level off at about 5 million a year. That’s not much better than the 4.91 million homes sold last year, the worst showing in 13 years.

The depressed housing market has weighed on the broader economy. Declining home prices have kept people from selling their houses and moving to find jobs in growing areas. They have also made people feel less wealthy. That has reduced consumer spending, which drives about 70 percent of economic activity.

One sign of the housing industry’s struggles is that fewer first-time buyers are entering the market. The number of first-timers ticked down to 35 percent of sales last month. In healthy times, they drive about half of sales.

First-time buyers are critical because they tend to improve their properties and invest in their communities, a combination that raises home values. And their purchases allow sellers to move up to pricier homes.

Instead, the market has been saturated with foreclosures, which force prices down. Sales of homes at risk of foreclosure fell in May. But they still made up 31 percent of all purchases. And many pending foreclosures are backlogged in the courts or held up by state and federal probes into questionable foreclosure practices by lenders.

Until the glut of foreclosures are cleared and people think it’s a safe time to buy, “it is unlikely that home prices can recover on a sustained basis,” said Steven Wood, chief economist at Insight Economics.

Bigger required down payments, tougher lending rules, heavy credit-card and student-loan debt and a shortage of desirable starter homes are keeping many would-be buyers away. Even some who do have enough money for a down payment and a solid credit history are holding off, worried that home prices will keep falling.

Investors are filling some of the void. They are spending cash to scoop up deeply discounted homes in hard-hit areas of Phoenix, Las Vegas and Tampa. Last month, investors accounted for 19 percent of all sales.

All the while, previously occupied homes are cheap and in great supply.

Re-sold homes are a bargain compared with new homes. The median sales price for a previously occupied home in May was $166,500. The median price of a new home is nearly 31 percent higher than the price for a re-sale _ around twice the normal markup.

The gap is largely due to the flood of foreclosures and short sales. (Short sales occur when lenders accept less than what’s owed on the mortgage.) A record 1 million homes were lost to foreclosures last year. And foreclosure tracker RealtyTrac Inc. expects 1.2 million more will be lost this year.

Another problem for the housing market is the glut of unsold homes. In May, the supply fell slightly to 3.72 million homes. At last month’s sales pace, it would take more than nine months to clear those homes.

Homes priced for less than $100,000 are selling briskly, but more expensive homes are having trouble finding buyers. Analysts say a healthy supply can be cleared in six months.

The situation is worse when taking into account the “shadow inventory” of homes, economists say. These are homes that are in the early stages of the foreclosure process but, because of backlogged courts or the government probes, haven’t hit the market for re-sale.

Sales fell across most regions in May. Sales dropped 6.4 percent in the Midwest, 5.1 percent in the South and 2.5 percent in the Northeast. There was no change in the West.

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A little-known Russian company is highlighting its firefighting successes to promote the world’s first purpose-built jet water bomber at the Paris Air Show.

In the last few years, the Beriev Be-200 Altair has helped fight massive forest fires in Greece, Italy, Portugal, Malaysia, Indonesia and Israel.

The company so far has a total of 26 confirmed and optional sales in Russia, France and Azerbaijan, and is seeking more at this week’s Paris Air Show at Le Bourget.

Because of the growing threat of huge forest fires sparked by global warming, Beriev now anticipates a global market for well over 100 water bombers in the next decade loans for people with bad credit.

Beriev is especially interested in breaking into the U.S. market, where air tankers tend to be old, converted military planes, marketing director Denis V. Didenko said.

Dozens of these will need to be replaced in the next decade and Beriev is moving quickly to obtain certification from the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration for the Be-200, which has just been certified by Europe’s aviation safety agency.

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Prime Minister George Papandreou has called for a fall referendum on “changes to the political system,” including to the country’s constitution.

Opening a three-day parliamentary debate that will culminate in a confidence vote late Tuesday, Papandreou blames Greece’s bloated state sector for bringing the country to its knees and has vowed to effect deep changes.

He also says the constitutional revision will make it easier to prosecute delinquent government officials saving account pay day loan.

He also says Greece is in talks for a new bailout package “roughly equal” to the first package of euro110 billion ($155 billion) agreed to in May 2010.

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When I was in Grade 12, I  parted with $550  to buy 100 shares of an initial public offering (IPO) of stock in a Burlington, Ont. company called Linear Technology.

I wasn’t a major capitalist starting my march to millions. I was a cashier at Beaver Lumber and my parents thought I should invest my hard-earned savings in a company run by a family friend.

Nine years earlier, Dr. Douglas Barber and colleagues at Westinghouse Canada had mortgaged their homes to the hilt to help buy out the solid state services department of Westinghouse Canada. Westinghouse had decided to sell the division. With other investors, they set up Linear Tech to make integrated circuits for the hearing aid industry.

In less than a decade they had over 50 per cent of the global market in hearing aid chips. When Linear Technology went public (now called  Gennum Corporation), my parents thought the company was a good place for me to invest instead of squandering my cash at the mall.

They were right. Gennum expanded in the semiconductor field and their chips are now used for video and data communications.Think HDTV. Over the next 17 years, those 100 shares became 900 from two 3-for-1 stock splits. My original $550 investment increased to $17,775 when the stock reached its high of $19.75 on May 19, 1999.

So far, so good. The problem is that I expected my stock to rise forever and it hasn’t and I didn’t learn the art of when to sell. Gennum closed at $7.08 Thursday at about a third of its peak. The stock has been in the $4 to $8 range for the last several years. My investment is worth $6,300, for a paper loss from the peak of nearly $11,500.

So what should I have done?

I wanted to use the stock to fund my children’s post-secondary education and so I should have set a stop loss order so that when the stock decreased by say 20 per cent it would have been sold. I could then have invested that in RESPs and also received a the 20 per cent government grant.

If I believe the stock has a future, I should sit tight, keeping an eye on its prospects by the reading annual and quarterly reports and monitoring news about the company. That’s what I’m doing. Gennum has blazed many hi-tech trails and I think it has a bright future.

HD televisions are ubiquitous. Revenue, net income, and earnings per share have greatly increased since 2009. 

One lesson is clear: Becoming a financially literate adult is overdue for me. I have to do my homework and hold it the stock for the right reasons or fold.

See also:  As the market wobbles is it time to sell?

Contact Peggy Mackenzie at pmackenzie@thestar.ca  or follow her on Twitter: PeggyMackenzie 

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Stocks are poised for another day of losses ahead of several key economic reports.

The government will release figures on the number of people who applied for unemployment benefits for the first time last week. Economists expect that the number fell to 420,000 from 427,000 the previous week. Separate reports will shed light on the construction of new homes and manufacturing growth in the Philadelphia region.

Ahead of the opening bell, Dow Jones industrial average futures are down 32, or 0 bad credit payday loans.3 percent, to 11,799. S&P 500 futures are down 3, or 0.2 percent, to 1,257. Nasdaq 100 futures are down 4, or 0.2 percent, to 2,201.

The Dow fell nearly 180 points Wednesday after unrest in Greece rattled financial markets.

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