Business Watch

Keystone selling for $6.2M

LEGUMEX Walker Inc. (TSX:LWP) said Monday it will pay roughly $6.2 million in stock and cash for Keystone Grain Ltd.

The Winnipeg company first announced a deal for the processor and seller of sunflowers and sunflower products in August, but did not reveal the price.

Under an agreement Monday, Legumex Walker said it will pay $1.28 million in cash and 587,437 in shares.

In addition, the sellers will receive 660,000 warrants for Legumex shares, with an exercise price of $9.50, that expire two years after the closing deal.

Legumex Walker shares last traded for $8.40 on the Toronto Stock Exchange.

Legumex Walker said it expects the acquisition will be immediately accretive to its 2013 earnings.

Keystone's assets include a sunflower-processing facility and a flax-processing facility in Winkler, and a bird-food-processing facility in Winnipeg, with a combined capacity of 62,000 tonnes annually.

Legumex Walker is a processor and seller of pulses and other special crops and canola products.

Ford offers workers cash

ARMED with a new collective agreement ratified over the weekend, Ford is offering a $50,000 incentive to about 1,000 employees eligible for early retirement in order to recall hundreds of laid-off workers.

The incentive available in the fourth quarter will also provide a voucher for a new car along with the standard pension program.

Ford has about 800 employees on layoff. It agreed in negotiations to investments that could create about 600 new jobs at its assembly complex in Oakville, Ont.

IMF head calls for action

WASHINGTON -- The head of the International Monetary Fund on Monday called on government leaders in Europe and the U.S. to take urgent action in dealing with the global economy.

IMF chief Christine Lagarde said the global economy is gradually recovering but the IMF projects growth will likely be weaker than anticipated.

"Uncertainty in the eurozone remains the greatest risk to the global economy today," Lagarde said in a speech to the Peterson Institute for International Economics.

Canaccord cuts 16 offices

TORONTO -- Canaccord Financial Inc. (TSX:CF) is closing 16 of its wealth management offices in Canada and reducing the number of advisers at the remaining locations in a bid to restructure the money-losing business.

The company said Monday the move will cut the number of wealth management offices in half but would not say how many people would lose jobs.

Canaccord will have 180 investment advisory teams across Canada after the cuts compared with 269 at June 30.

Amtrak tests higher speed

TRENTON, N.J. -- Amtrak announced Monday it will operate test trains overnight at 265 kilometres per hour in four stretches from Maryland to Massachusetts.

The tests were to start at about 10:30 p.m. Monday in New Jersey and to continue into next week, Amtrak spokesman Cliff Cole said.

All the locations may one day have regular service at about 260 km/h; the current top speed is 240 km/h.

QLT sells Visudyne

QLT Inc. announced Monday the sale of Visudyne, the drug that put the Vancouver-based firm on the map, for $112.5 million to Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc. as it continues to narrow its focus to new drug development.

QLT chairman Jason Aryeh said the company's board is working on how to return the cash to shareholders.

He also said the company would again get smaller, but not how small.

Facebook keeps falling

NEW YORK -- Facebook Inc.'s stock fell almost nine per cent Monday after an article in the financial magazine Barron's said it is "still too pricey."

Though Facebook's stock has plunged since its May IPO, Andrew Bary at Barron's said the stock trades at "high multiples of both sales and earnings, even as uncertainty about the outlook for its business grows."

At issue is the shift of Facebook's users to mobile devices. The company is still figuring out how to advertise to people who use mobile phones and tablets to access the social network.

-- from the news services

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition September 25, 2012 B5