President Obama nominated Bank of America executive Stefan M. Selig to oversee international trade as he seeks to jump-start the economy by appointing a Wall Street veteran to the Commerce Department.
The White House announced the nomination Thursday, subject to confirmation by the Senate. Selig, Bank of America’s executive vice chairman of global corporate and investment banking, would report to Penny Pritzker, the Chicago businesswoman confirmed in June as Commerce secretary.
Selig, 50, would replace Francisco Sanchez as undersecretary for international trade, a job that involves promoting American industry at home and abroad as head of Commerce’s International Trade Administration. Sanchez said in September he would resign from the post he has held since 2009.
“Stefan Selig is a tremendous talent and we’ll be lucky to have him join the Commerce Department,” Pritzker said.
Selig was lured to the position by Pritzker, who decided a Wall Street dealmaker could help the United States narrow its trade deficit. The U.S. trade gap was little changed in August at $38.8 billion, the Commerce Department reported last month, as imports and exports stalled.
— Bloomberg News
A Tesla Model S electric car caught fire this week after hitting road debris on a Tennessee freeway, the third fire in a Model S in the past five weeks.
The blaze Wednesday near Smyrna engulfed the front of the car. A spokeswoman for the Tennessee Highway Patrol says the Model S ran over a tow hitch, which hit the undercarriage of the car, causing an electrical fire.
It’s the second Model S blaze involving road debris. Last month, a driver near Seattle hit debris that pierced a shield and the battery pack, causing a fire. In the other fire, a driver in Mexico crashed into a concrete wall and a tree at high speed.
Shares of the carmaker, based in Palo Alto, Calif., fell 7.5 percent to $139.77 Thursday. That is on top of Wednesday’s plunge of 14.5 percent, after investors were spooked by a battery shortage. The shares are still up 312 percent this year.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said it will contact Tennessee authorities to see if there are safety problems that need further action.
— Associated Press
● Walt Disney’s earnings climbed 12 percent in the company’s fiscal fourth quarter as parks revenue rose and its interactive division posted an operating profit on the surprising strength of its new video game, “Disney Infinity.” Disney also set the release date for “Star Wars: Episode VII” at Dec. 18, 2015, and said it would produce four original TV series for Netflix based on characters including “Daredevil” that would begin playing in 2015.
● The Internal Revenue Service issued $4 billion in fraudulent tax refunds last year to people using stolen identities, with some of the money going to addresses in Bulgaria, Lithuania and Ireland, according to an inspector general’s report released Thursday. The IRS sent a total of 655 tax refunds to a single address in Lithuania, and 343 refunds went to a lone address in Shanghai. In the United States, more fraudulent returns went to Miami than any other city.
● Marriott International on Thursday announced plans to buy Protea Hospitality Holdings, a Cape Town, South Africa-based hotel group with 116 properties. The deal would nearly double Marriott’s presence in Africa, making it the largest hotel company on the continent. The Bethesda-based hotel giant said it had signed a letter of intent with Protea, but did not disclose the terms of the proposed deal. Marriott said the deal would give the company a leg up in Africa, where Protea manages, franchises and leases hotels in seven countries, including Nigeria and Uganda.
● LivingSocial has agreed to sell its profitable South Korean daily deals business, Ticket Monster, to rival Groupon for $260 million in cash and stock, the companies announced Thursday. The deal will fetch $100 million in cash and up to $160 million in Groupon Class A common stock for District-based LivingSocial, although the final terms will be determined when the deal closes in the first half of next year.
— From staff reports, news services
● 8:30 a.m.: October jobs report and personal income data for September released.