Compiled by Mike Mason
TOP STORIES
Irvine-based Allergan Inc. finally wrapped up its $3.2 billion buy of Santa Barbara-based Inamed Corp. The deal had been held up for months on two fronts. One, it took Allergan a long time to get regulatory approval for the deal. A second holdup was shareholder-related. It took Allergan longer than initially expected to buy more than 90% of Inamed’s shares. Allergan settled both issues during the past few weeks British retailer GUS PLC turned down a $12.3 billion offer for its Costa Mesa-based Experian Group unit. The bidders include private equity firms Thomas H. Lee Partners LP and Bain Capital LLC, both of Boston. They are said to be considering a second offer for Experian. GUS said last year that it planned to spin off Experian, but did not give a specific timeline or lay out exactly how it planned to do it. Some have said the company might sell its stake in an initial public offering.
Costa Mesa drug maker Valeant Pharmaceuticals International said a late-stage trial for its key hepatitis C drug proved the treatment safer but not as effective than the standard treatment for the liver disease. The results are a big blow to Valeant, which has pinned high hopes on Viramidine as a replacement for its fading flagship ribavirin, the bellwether treatment for hepatitis C. Investors punished Valeant’s shares, sending them down 14% on the news The United Network for Organ Sharing said it will closely monitor activity at UCI Medical Center amid problems with the hospital’s liver and kidney transplant programs The Beckman Foundation gave $20 million to the City of Hope to fund the Arnold and Mabel Beckman Center for Cancer Im-munotherapeutics and Tumor Immunology, which is set to be a five-story building with laboratory. The foundation was created by Mabel and Arnold Beckman, the founder of Fullerton-based medical device maker Beckman Coulter Inc. Irvine-based Spectrum Pharmaceuticals Inc. said it plans to buy the oncology drug assets of Princeton, N.J.-based Targent Inc. The deal could be worth more than $6.5 million.
Three lawsuits were filed seeking to block the extension of the Foothill (241) Toll Road through San Onofre State Park. State Attorney General Bill Lockyer filed two suits with environmentalists submitting another Nationwide Health Properties Inc., a Newport Beach-based owner of nursing homes and other healthcare facilities, said it’s paying $419 million for 32 sites from Hearthstone Assisted Living Inc. of Houston. Hearthstone plans to lease back the facilities from Nationwide. Located in 10 states, the sites are assisted living centers for the elderly and Alzheimer’s patients. The deal is expected to close by May 31, subject to regulatory approval OC home foreclosures in February fell 29%, versus a month earlier, according to Irvine-based RealtyTrac Inc. Foreclosures had increased 30% in January from a month earlier. February saw 422 homes enter some stage of foreclosure, said RealtyTrac, a provider of foreclosure data nationwide. That’s a rate of one new foreclosure for every 2,297 homes.
The parent of Orange-based Ameriquest Mortgage Co. is set to pay $50 million to California home loan borrowers as part of a $325 million settlement the company agreed to pay stemming from charges of deceptive lending practices Santa Ana-based First American Corp. said it bought Cambridge, Mass.-based Harvard Design and Mapping Co., which provides map technology to businesses and governments. Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed.
Sunstone Hotel Investors Inc. closed the buy of its highest-profile hotel yet, the Hilton Times Square, just a half block west of Times Square in New York. The San Clemente-based hotel operator paid $243 million for the hotel. Sunstone also picked up a $15 million option to convert the hotel to a franchise. The hotel will be run by Sunstone Hotel Properties, a unit of Interstate Hotels & Resorts Inc. Greg Weaver, who headed Anaheim-based Pacific Sunwear of California Inc. during its heady growth years, plans to leave the retailer for good as of April 1. For the past year, Weaver has served as Pacific Sunwear’s executive chairman, helping to launch the company’s third chain of stores, One Thousand Steps. The shoe chain plans to open its first stores in April Foothill Ranch-based Wet Seal Inc. reported a profit of $684,000 for the three months ended Jan. 28. A year earlier Wet Seal posted a loss of $46 million. Wet Seal’s net loss was $2.8 million in the period. That included $6.8 million in charges for stock compensation. Sales in the quarter rose 19% to $141 million. Sales at stores open at least a year grew 45% in the period. Wet Seal expects to open 20 to 25 new stores during the year. It expects same-store sales growth in the mid-single digits for the next few years.
ECONOMIC INDICATORS
Mixed: Orange County’s housing picture in February, with the median price of a detached home up 3% to $721,190 versus January, and 9% higher than a year earlier, according to the California Association of Realtors. The number of home sales fell 9% in February from January and were down 27% from a year earlier.
