Obama to meet with lawmakers on shutdown Wednesday

WASHINGTON — A White House official says President Barack Obama has invited congressional leaders to the White House Wednesday for a meeting on the government shutdown.

The official says Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, House Speaker John Boehner, and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi have been invited to the meeting. The official says Obama will urge the House to pass a spending bill to allow the government to reopen.

The government shut down when Congress failed to pass a spending bill ahead of a midnight deadline.

The official insisted on anonymity because the person was not authorized to publicly discuss the meeting before it was announced.

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Revlon CEO Ennis resigns from post

NEW YORK — Makeup company Revlon Inc. said Wednesday that CEO Alan Ennis is leaving to pursue other interests.

The company named former CEO David Kennedy to the post on an interim basis. Ennis had served as CEO since May 2009.

The company, controlled by billionaire businessman Ronald Perelman, has been dealing with declining revenue.

In its most recent quarter, reported in July, net income more than doubled, bolstered by a large insurance gain related to a fire that destroyed a Venezuelan plant. But revenue slipped 2 percent to $350.1 million from $357.1 million, stung by unfavorable foreign currency translation.

It has also been dealing with regulatory issues. In June, Revlon agreed to pay an $850,000 fine to settle federal charges that it withheld key information from shareholders about a "going-private" transaction.

Kennedy, 66, had served as CEO from 2006 to 2009 and is currently Revlon Inc.'s vice chairman. He started at Revlon in 2002 as executive vice president and president of Revlon International.

His appointment as interim CEO is effective immediately.

New York-based Revlon said Wednesday that it expects to name a permanent successor soon.

Its shares slipped a penny to $27.99 in morning trading. The stock has traded between $13.91 and $28.42 in the past 52 weeks.

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US budget deadlock spooks investors

LONDON — Financial markets grew increasingly downbeat Wednesday as investors fretted over the partial shutdown of the U.S. government. Even Italy's stock market gave up ground despite widespread relief over the Italian government's victory in a confidence vote.

The political upheavals in Washington D.C. and Rome have been the main focus in the financial markets this week. While the gridlock in the U.S. capital was showing few signs of resolution on the second day of the partial shutdown, the developments in Italy pointed to a crisis averted.

"Investors are having a little rethink over the implications and longevity of the U.S. government shutdown," said Andrew Wilkinson, chief economic strategist at Miller Tabak & Co.

In Europe, the FTSE 100 index of leading shares was down 0.6 percent at 6.419 while Germany's DAX fell 1.1 percent to 8,596. The CAC-40 in France was 1.3 percent lower at 4,144.

In the U.S., the Dow Jones industrial average was down 0.8 percent at 15,066 while the broader S&P 500 index fell 0.7 percent at 1,683.

One market that bucked the trend for most of the day was Italy's FTSE MIB, which briefly hit a two-year high.

The gains came after Silvio Berlusconi threw his support behind the government of Premier Enrico Letta in a confidence vote, acknowledging defeat on the Senate floor after defections in his party robbed him of the backing he needed to bring down the government.

Investors breathed a sigh of relief knowing that Italy averted a new election and the government can go ahead with its economic reform program.

Milan's FTSE MIB was up 0.2 percent at 18,028. Earlier, it had traded at a two-year high of 18,340, before mounting concerns over the U.S. budget gridlock dented sentiment.

Although most analysts said they expect the U.S. budget stalemate to be resolved before the shutdown inflicts damage on the U.S. economy, the latest stalemate has raised concerns over whether Congress will be able to increase the country's debt ceiling later this month. If it doesn't, the U.S. would face a potential default, a development that could inflict massive damage on the global economy.

"The probability that the government goes right up to the wire on the debt ceiling, thus causing some destabilization in equity markets, is higher than we previously thought," said Dan Greenhaus, chief global strategist at BTIG. "We had said we were starting to get nervous. If this continues, nervousness will have to give way to fright."

The dollar was also under pressure from the budget deadlock.

It was further hampered against the euro by a suggestion from European Central Bank President Mario Draghi that the bank is willing to use "all available instruments" to keep market interest rates from rising and hurting a fledgling recovery. The euro was up 0.5 percent at $1.3585 and not far off its year high of $1.3638. The dollar was 0.8 percent lower at 97.21 yen.

Earlier in Asia, markets were solid following the previous day's relatively strong showing in U.S. markets. Hong Kong's Hang Seng rose 0.6 percent to 22,984.48 while South Korea's Kospi rose marginally to 1,999.47. Markets in mainland China were closed for a public holiday.

However, Japan's Nikkei 225 index plummeted 2.2 percent to close at 14,170.49 after the government announced Tuesday it would go ahead with a sales tax increase in April. The tax, intended to offset the country's soaring public debt, will rise from 5 percent to 8 percent.

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Shutdown hits tribes, but some services continue

BILLINGS, Mont. — Indian tribes across the U.S. prepared to suspend some federal programs and pay for others out of pocket amid a government shutdown expected to have magnified effects on the many reservations that depend heavily on outside assistance.

Some activities considered essential will continue, including law enforcement, firefighting, schools and some social services, Bureau of Indian Affairs spokeswoman Nedra Darling said. But other programs are sure to take a hit, such as financial assistance for the needy, payments for foster care and oversight of environmental, wildlife and cultural programs.

The full scope of the shutdown's effects on tribes remains uncertain; tribal leaders say the severity will depend on how long it lasts. The BIA provides services to more than 1.7 million American Indians and Alaska Natives from more than 500 recognized tribes.

"Do we just throw kids onto the street or do we help them? Most likely we're going to help those families and do whatever we can until this is unresolved," said Tracy "Ching" King, president of northern Montana's Fort Belknap Reservation.

King says the reservation's Gros Ventre and Assiniboine tribes will pay for affected programs themselves until federal payments resume. But he warns that could hurt tribal finances already strained from prior federal cuts. Within just a few weeks, carrying the cost of federal programs will cost the tribe roughly $1 million, King said.

Other tribes, such as the Crow Indians in southeastern Montana, have chosen to furlough workers now rather than risk not being repaid by the federal government down the road. Crow Chairman Darrin Old Coyote said dozens of workers likely would be furloughed, although an exact figure wasn't immediately available.

"We're taking a proactive approach," Old Coyote said. "There's no guarantee (that tribes will be repaid), and we don't want to be out millions of dollars."

During the last government shutdown in the mid-1990s, general assistance payments from the BIA were delayed for nearly 53,000 American Indian recipients, according to the National Congress of American Indians.

Such payments total about $42 million annually, and tribal leaders say they help offset chronic unemployment levels. On the Fort Belknap Reservation, for example, the unemployment rate hovers at around 70 percent of tribal members, King said.

"To get them out of that rut, you have to invest in them somehow. You want to encourage them to work and see what their talents are," King said. "But if this (shutdown) continues, we'll have to look at all of our programs individually and say can we afford this, to see what we could do to provide services to our most needy."

The NCAI said other areas where cuts could be felt most acutely include nutrition programs that distribute food to an average of 76,500 people a month from an estimated 276 tribes.

The group said that even if the shutdown is resolved soon, budget cuts already planned for 2013 will mean less money for the Indian Health Service, education programs, law enforcement, housing and road maintenance work.

"The (federal government's) trust responsibility to tribal nations is not a line item, and tribal programs must be exempt from budget cuts in any budget deal," the group said in a statement.

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Monsanto 4th-qtr loss widens as seed sales decline

WASHINGTON — Monsanto reported worse-than-expected losses for its fiscal fourth quarter on Wednesday, due to lower sales of its genetically engineered seeds.

The company forecast for fiscal 2014 also came in below Wall Street expectations, and it revealed plans to buy farming software and data firm The Climate Corporation. The combination sent shares lower in premarket trading.

The St. Louis company recorded a loss of $249 million, or 47 cents per share, for the quarter ended Aug. 31. That was wider than its loss of $264 million, or 42 cents per share, in the 2012 fourth quarter. Revenue climbed 5 percent to $2.2 billion, from $2.1 billion last year.

Analysts, on average, expected a loss of 43 cents per share, on sales of $2.26 billion, according to data provider FactSet.

The company's performance was hurt by a steep drop in sales of genetically modified soybean seeds, which fell 38 percent to $87 million. That drop was offset by higher sales of the company's best-selling product, genetically modified corn seeds, which rose 5.1 percent to $618 million. But overall seed sales still edged lower to $1.19 billion for the quarter

Looking ahead, Monsanto said it expects to report earnings per share of $5 to $5.20 in fiscal 2014, including 14 cents from its planned acquisition of the Climate Corporation.

Analysts were looking for $5.31 in earnings per share for fiscal 2014, on average.

Company shares fell 79 cents to $104.26 in midday trading, recovering from a low of $101.79 earlier in the session. The stock started the day up 11 percent since the start of the year and near the top end of its 52-week trading range of $82.70 to $109.33.

Monsanto said in a separate release it would pay $930 million in cash for the Climate Corporation, which was founded in 1996 by engineers from Google and other Silicon Valley companies. The company's technology uses weather forecasting and data analysis to help farmers plan their growing seasons.

Monsanto, which has dominated the bioengineered-seed business for more than a decade, reiterated its expectation for ongoing earnings growth in the "mid-teens" for fiscal 2014, based on the company's international growth.

In June, Chinese regulators approved the importation of Monsanto's Intacta soybeans, the first variety of the bean that has been genetically modified to repel pests that eat the crop. The new soybean is rolling out in Brazil this season and will be available in Argentina the following year. Both countries are major exporters to China. Intacta is the company's first product specifically designed for use outside the U.S.

The company's biotech seeds have genetically engineered traits that the company says benefit farmers enough that they come out ahead, despite the seeds' higher cost.

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US companies add 166,000 jobs in September

WASHINGTON — U.S. businesses added just 166,000 jobs in September, only slightly more than the previous two months. The lack of improvement in hiring, along with the threat of a prolonged government shutdown, could help persuade the Federal Reserve to delay scaling back its stimulus.

Payroll company ADP said Wednesday that private employers added just 159,000 jobs in August and 161,000 in July. Both were lower than the previous estimates.

The figures are taking on greater importance because they may be the only measure of the September job market for some time. The Labor Department will have to delay its September jobs report, scheduled for Friday, now that it appears the government shutdown will go past Wednesday.

The ADP data suggest that the economy is growing too slowly to rapidly boost hiring. Economists forecast that it expanded by a 1.5 percent to 2 percent annual rate in the July-September quarter, down from a 2.5 percent annual rate in the April-June quarter.

At the same time, hiring has slowed, according to the government's more comprehensive employment figures. Employers have added 155,000 jobs a month in the four months through August. That's down from an average of 205,000 in the first four months of the year.

The ADP figures show job growth remained sluggish in September.

"The job market appears to have softened in recent months," said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Analytics, which helps compile the report. "While job growth has slowed, there remains a general resilience in the market. Job creation continues to be consistent with a slowly declining unemployment rate."

Joseph LaVorgna, chief U.S. economist at Deutsche Bank, said the pace of job creation remains too weak to convince the Fed to scale back its $85-billion-a-month in bond purchases at its meeting later this month.

And the partial government shutdown could slow economic growth, particularly if it lasts more than a week. A prolonged shutdown may lead the Fed to delay any reduction in its purchases until next year.

"My sense is folks on the Fed would want to wait and see what the fallout is from that," Zandi said. "It's more likely to be early next year rather than this year."

Prior to the shutdown, economists had been optimistic that economic growth could strengthen in the October-December quarter to an annual rate between 2.5 percent and 3 percent. But David Stockton, an economist at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, estimates the shutdown will shave about 0.15 percentage points off the economy's growth rate each week it lasts.

The ADP report covers hiring only in the private sector. The figures often diverge from the government's more comprehensive jobs report. The government's September jobs report is expected to show that employers added 180,000 jobs, while the unemployment rate was unchanged at 7.3 percent.

Construction firms added 16,000 jobs last month, one of the few highlights in ADP's September report. But manufacturers gained just 1,000 and have cut jobs through the first nine months of the year, according to ADP.

Financial services firms shed 4,000 jobs. That likely reflects layoffs at many banks' mortgage processing divisions. The number of mortgage refinancing applications fell sharply after borrowing rates over the summer.

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Contact Chris Rugaber on Twitter at http://Twitter.com/ChrisRugaber .

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Now at your library: Streaming movies, music

SEATTLE — There's a new source to stream movies and other digital content, and it's not a tech company with tens of thousands of titles. It's something more familiar, and might even be just down the street: the public library.

Often thought of as stodgy brick-and-mortar havens for bibliophiles, libraries are trying out a new service that allows patrons to check out streaming movies, music, TV shows and audiobooks from anywhere they want.

It works similarly to Netflix: Through an app on a tablet or a browser on a personal computer, users can peruse dozens of movies and click on a film to "borrow" it. The content starts streaming, for free.

While libraries are already loaning e-books, the move to streaming is part of a larger shift for them to remain relevant in a digital world.

Libraries are "meeting patrons where they want to access content," said Kirk Blankenship, Electronic Resources Librarian for Seattle Public Libraries, which is using the service called Hoopla.

The service, from Ohio-based Midwest Tape, LLC, is also being used in Los Angeles, Salt Lake City, Topeka, Kan., and several others towns and cities nationwide. Hoopla launched in full in May with 20 library systems.

As of early September, there are about 220,000 people using the app, said Michael Manon, Hoopla's brand manager. The goal is to reach 100 library systems by year's end.

Libraries have always been a source of audiovisual entertainment. A 2012 Pew Research Center survey found that among patrons 16 years old and older, 40 percent visited libraries to borrow movies. Another 16 percent borrowed music.

In the Seattle area, DVDs and CDs of popular titles can have queues of hundreds of people waiting to check them out. E-books have been offered for years now.

"Public libraries do not have the budgets to compete with Amazon, Comcast, and Netflix and will not be able to pay a premium for online content," Blankenship said, adding that DVDs will continue to be the best way to offer popular movies.

Updating and maintaining that physical collection takes time and money. It also means libraries have to pay for the media upfront, while Hoopla allows them to pay per time a title is borrowed.

Those costs depend on the type of media and its release date, and range from 99 cents to $2.99. Seattle libraries have allocated $10,000 a month limit so far for Hoopla items and patrons are limited to 20 checkouts a month, Blankenship said.

That limit may change, depending on demand and how usage grows. Hoopla's launch won't affect the stocking of physical DVDs at library branches for the time being, Blankenship said.

For Seattle resident and library patron Jamie Koepnick-Herrera, Hoopla has joined her other streaming services such as Netflix, which she uses for movies, and Hulu, which she uses to watch current seasons of television shows. On Hoopla, she found the yoga videos she was looking for.

"I think it provides a great free source of entertainment for families who can't afford to get a movie for family night or for teenagers to have access to that album they can't afford," Koepnick-Herrera said.

Hoopla's movie and television collection is impressive in its numbers: About 3,000 titles.

It is, however, chockfull of B-movies. Some of the newer movies weren't exactly hits in the theaters, such as Keanu Reeves' "Generation Um" and Lee Daniels' "The Paperboy," which preceded his hit "The Butler."

But there are also many older films, including some classics and a healthy choice of foreign flicks. The collection also includes documentaries, such as "Gasland" and "Restrepo," and public television documentaries, like Ken Burn's "Prohibition."

Hoopla offers plenty of National Geographic and British TV shows, but not much else from TV.

There are also educational choices, such as preparation videos for high school advanced placement exams.

On the music side, the choices are far greater and newer — about 300,000 titles.

"The music industry is more attuned to the digital," Hoopla's Manon said. "Unfortunately, for movies and television, the owners are a bit more apprehensive."

So far, Hoopla is available on Apple and Android products. They are developing apps for Xbox and Chromecast next.

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Manuel Valdes can be reached at http://twitter.com/ByManuelValdes

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Court favors Abercrombie in Okla. suit over hijab

TULSA, Okla. — A federal appeals court has dismissed claims by an Oklahoma woman who says she wasn't hired by Abercrombie & Fitch because her headscarf conflicted with the retailer's dress code, which has since been changed.

A federal judge initially sided with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which filed the lawsuit on behalf of Samantha Elauf. The EEOC alleged that Elauf wasn't hired in 2008 at an Abercrombie store in Tulsa's Woodland Hills Mall because her hijab violated the clothing retailer's "Look Policy."

The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reversed that decision Tuesday. The court said Elauf never told Abercrombie she needed a religious accommodation, even though she was wearing the headscarf during her interview.

The Ohio-based company changed its policy three years ago. It recently settled similar lawsuits in California.

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Derby Pie maker, restaurant end trademark dispute

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — A chocolate-nut pie by any other name may be just as sweet, but it won't be a Derby Pie.

Kern's Kitchen, the Louisville-based company that makes the famous dessert, and Claudia Sanders Dinner House settled a dispute over the name Derby Pie. Under the agreement approved by U.S. District Judge Gregory Van Tatenhove, Claudia Sanders Dinner House and its employees are barred from using the Derby Pie name to promote the chocolate pie made with pecans and chocolate chips. The restaurant is located in Shelbyville, about 30 miles east of Louisville, where the Kentucky Derby is held each year.

The sweet treat was created in 1950 and is sometimes sold at the horse race.

Kern's Kitchen sued Claudia Sanders Dinner House in June, alleging the company violated its trademark.

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Outside US, ripple effects of budget battle feared

PARIS — Top European officials are keeping a worried eye on the U.S. government shutdown, saying it could pose a risk for the continent's fledgling recovery.

The U.S. has the world's largest economy and close business ties with Europe. So the shutdown, which has seen some 800,000 federal employees put on furlough, could hurt growth around the world if Congress does not agree on a new budget deal within days.

The president of the European Central Bank, Mario Draghi, said Wednesday that the shutdown "is a risk if protracted," though he added that the "the impression is that it won't be."

Earlier, France's top officials expressed similar concerns. France, the second-largest economy in the 17-member eurozone, is just emerging from a double-dip recession. Like much of the region, its economy remains fragile.

"If this situation lasts, it could slow down the ongoing economic recovery," Pierre Moscovici, the finance minister, said at the government's weekly Cabinet meeting.

The U.S. Congress also needs to find a deal on raising the country's debt ceiling later this month. If it doesn't, the U.S. would face a potential default, a development that could inflict massive damage on the global economy.

Draghi, however, was not worried about that prospect. Asked if he thought the U.S. could default on some of its debt obligations, he said: "I don't."

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