Pope's resignation 'shows leadership'

By Roland Martin, CNN Contributor

February 16, 2013 -- Updated 1649 GMT (0049 HKT)

Longest-reigning popes

Longest-reigning popes

Longest-reigning popes

Longest-reigning popes

Longest-reigning popes

Longest-reigning popes

Longest-reigning popes

Longest-reigning popes

Longest-reigning popes

Longest-reigning popes

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Pope Benedict stuns world by announcing he will resign


• Roland Martin says it's a wise decision for a leader to step down when his powers fail


• He says a mark of a good leader is the care he takes about the institution he is leaving


• Martin: Too many in power try to hang on after they are no longer capable

Editor's note: Roland Martin is a syndicated columnist and author of "The First: President Barack Obama's Road to the White House." He is a commentator for the TV One cable network and host/managing editor of its Sunday morning news show, "Washington Watch with Roland Martin."

(CNN) -- When Thurgood Marshall retired from the U.S. Supreme Court in June 1991, a reporter asked him what were the medical reasons that contributed to his leaving the bench -- and its lifetime appointment -- after serving for nearly 25 years. He was his usual blunt self.

"What's wrong with me?" Marshall said at the packed news conference. "I'm old. I'm getting old and falling apart."

When the news broke this week that Pope Benedict XVI was stepping down as the spiritual leader of 1.2 billion Roman Catholics because of his concerns about being able to do the job, many began to speculate that there were other reasons for the decision.

Roland Martin

We have become accustomed to a pope dying in office. That's not a surprise. It has been nearly 600 years since the last pope, Gregory XII, quit in 1415.

Even though the job of pope is a lifetime appointment, frankly, it is selfish of any individual to hold on to the job for dear life, knowing full well they don't have the capacity to do the job.

"Strength of mind and body are necessary, strength which in the last few months has deteriorated in me to the extent that I have had to recognize my incapacity to adequately fulfill the ministry entrusted to me," according to a statement from Pope Benedict released by the Vatican.

Whether we want to be honest or not, it was sad to watch the decline of Pope John Paul II. He was a vibrant figure when he became pope in 1978, traveling the world and spreading the gospel to anyone who would listen. But toward the end of his life in 2005, he was barely able to move or talk, clearly worn down by significant health challenges.

Any leader who respects the organization they serve should have the common sense to know when it's time to say goodbye. We've seen countless examples of CEOs, pastors, politicians and others hang on and on to a position of power, hurting the very people they were elected or chosen to serve.

It takes considerable courage for anyone to step away from the power bestowed upon them by a position, as well as the trappings that come with it.

I'll leave it to others to try to figure out other reasons behind the resignation. But we should at least acknowledge the value of an ego-less decision that reflects humility and concern about the very institution the pope pledged his life to.

All leaders should be concerned about their institution continuing to grow and thrive once their days are no more. That's why a proper succession plan is vitally important.

Too often we have assessed great leaders by what they did in their positions. But their final legacy really is defined by how they left a place.

Pope Benedict XVI knows full well the Catholic Church cannot grow and prosper if its leader is limited in traveling and attending to his flock. There comes a time when one chapter must end and another begins. He has more days behind him than in front of him. He should enjoy his last years in peace and tranquility, without having to worry about trying to do the work designed for a younger man.

Follow us on Twitter @CNNOpinion.

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The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Roland S. Martin.

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Opera world stages its own awards as faces budget crunch

LONDON (Reuters) – The world of opera, faced with budget cuts and wanting to raise appreciation of opera, has launched its own annual international awards, unveiling a shortlist of finalists in 23 categories.

The Operas, which will be presented at a ceremony in London on April 22, are the brainchild of Opera Magazine and British businessman Harry Hyman.

Opera Magazine editor John Allison said he hoped the awards would bring recognition to opera at a time when many opera houses were struggling to make ends meet due to a decline in private sponsorships and cuts in state subsidies.

English National Opera, one of London’s two principal opera companies, last month announced a loss for 2012 with audience figures down 9 percent and a drop in its public subsidy, while Paris Opera chief Nicolas Joel has publicly decried budget cuts and said he did not intend to renew his contract in 2015.

“Opera houses all over the world are in a lot of difficulty at the moment as everything is being cut and everyone is feeling the pinch. Some smaller houses in the United States have closed,” Allison told Reuters.

“Opera houses work very hard and artists put their life and soul into their work but there are a lot of good performances that come and go and are not recognized. Hopefully these awards will raise opera in everyone’s conscience.”

Allison said the awards also aimed to boost support for new and emerging artists who struggle to make a living from their profession and receive little public recognition.

“Everyone has awards – films, books, music – but there just has not been a set of international awards for opera. We want to change that,” said Allison.

The International Opera Awards, to be known as The Operas, involve 23 categories that recognize “the achievements of all the performers, producers and teams that work in Opera”.

Awards will be given to best female singer, male singer, conductor, opera company, and chorus, and there is also a life-time achievement award and a readers’ award.

Prizes for young singers will come with bursaries attached.

Finalists for the male singer are tenors Aleksandrs Antonenko, Piotr Beczala, Joseph Calleja, Jonas Kaufmann, bass-baritone Luca Pisaroni, and baritone Bryn Terfel.

Female singers in the running for the award are Sarah Connolly, Joyce DiDonato, Evelyn Herlitzius, Catherine Naglestad, Nina Stemme, and Beatrice Uria-Monzon.

The conductors shortlisted are Britons Richard Farnes and Antonio Pappano, Germany’s Ingo Metzmacher and Christian Thielemann, and Italian Nicola Luisotti.

The opera companies running for the prize are Oper Frankfurt, Opera National de Lyon, Staatsoper Stuttgart, Stanislavsky Music Theatre Moscow and Theater an der Wien.

One category unlikely to be seen at the Grammys is accessibility with the Metropolitan Opera in New York, London-based Streetwise Opera, Teatro Sociale in Como, Italy, and Welsh National Opera all vying for that prize.

Allison said more than 1,500 nominations were received from 41 countries with the judging panel made up 10 opera experts ranging from critics and opera house chiefs to singers.

(Reporting by Belinda Goldsmith, editing by Paul Casiato)

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G20 steps back from currency brink, heat off Japan

MOSCOW (Reuters) - The Group of 20 nations declared on Saturday there would be no currency war and deferred plans to set new debt-cutting targets, underlining broad concern about the fragile state of the world economy.

Japan's expansive policies, which have driven down the yen, escaped direct criticism in a statement thrashed out in Moscow by policymakers from the G20, which spans developed and emerging markets and accounts for 90 percent of the world economy.

Analysts said the yen, which has dropped 20 percent as a result of aggressive monetary and fiscal policies to reflate the Japanese economy, may now continue to fall.

"The market will take the G20 statement as an approval for what it has been doing -- selling of the yen," said Neil Mellor, currency strategist at Bank of New York Mellon in London. "No censure of Japan means they will be off to the money printing presses."

After late-night talks, finance ministers and central bankers agreed on wording closer than expected to a joint statement issued last Tuesday by the Group of Seven rich nations backing market-determined exchange rates.

A draft communiqué on Friday had steered clear of the G7's call for economic policy not to be targeted at exchange rates. But the final version included a G20 commitment to refrain from competitive devaluations and stated monetary policy would be directed only at price stability and growth.

"The mood quite clearly early on was that we needed desperately to avoid protectionist measures ... that mood permeated quite quickly," Canadian Finance Minister Jim Flaherty told reporters, adding that the wording of the G20 statement had been hardened up by the ministers.

As a result, it reflected a substantial, but not complete, endorsement of Tuesday's proclamation by the G7 nations - the United States, Japan, Britain, Canada, France, Germany and Italy.

As with the G7 intervention, Tokyo said it gave it a green light to pursue its policies unchecked.

"I have explained that (Prime Minister Shinzo) Abe's administration is doing its utmost to escape from deflation and we have gained a certain understanding," Finance Minister Taro Aso told reporters.

"We're confident that if Japan revives its own economy that would certainly affect the world economy as well. We gained understanding on this point."

Flaherty admitted it would be difficult to gauge if domestic policies were aimed at weakening currencies or not.

NO FISCAL TARGETS

The G20 also made a commitment to a credible medium-term fiscal strategy, but stopped short of setting specific goals as most delegations felt any economic recovery was too fragile.

The communiqué said risks to the world economy had receded but growth remained too weak and unemployment too high.

"A sustained effort is required to continue building a stronger economic and monetary union in the euro area and to resolve uncertainties related to the fiscal situation in the United States and Japan, as well as to boost domestic sources of growth in surplus economies," it said.

A debt-cutting pact struck in Toronto in 2010 will expire this year if leaders fail to agree to extend it at a G20 summit of leaders in St Petersburg in September.

The United States says it is on track to meet its Toronto pledge but argues that the pace of future fiscal consolidation must not snuff out demand. Germany and others are pressing for another round of binding debt targets.

"We had a broad consensus in the G20 that we will stick to the commitment to fulfill the Toronto goals," German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said. "We do not have any interest in U.S.-bashing ... In St. Petersburg follow-up-goals will be decided."

The G20 put together a huge financial backstop to halt a market meltdown in 2009 but has failed to reach those heights since. At successive meetings, Germany has pressed the United States and others to do more to tackle their debts. Washington in turn has urged Berlin to do more to increase demand.

Backing in the communiqué for the use of domestic monetary policy to support economic recovery reflected the U.S. Federal Reserve's commitment to monetary stimulus through quantitative easing, or QE, to promote recovery and jobs.

QE entails large-scale bond buying -- $85 billion a month in the Fed's case -- that helps economic growth but has also unleashed destabilising capital flows into emerging markets.

A commitment to minimize such "negative spillovers" was an offsetting point in the text that China, fearful of asset bubbles and lost export competitiveness, highlighted.

"Major developed nations (should) pay attention to their monetary policy spillover," Vice Finance Minister Zhu Guangyao was quoted by state news agency Xinhua as saying in Moscow.

Russia, this year's chair of the G20, admitted the group had failed to reach agreement on medium-term budget deficit levels and expressed concern about ultra-loose policies that it and other emerging economies say could store up trouble for later.

On currencies, the G20 text reiterated its commitment last November, "to move more rapidly toward mores market-determined exchange rate systems and exchange rate flexibility to reflect underlying fundamentals, and avoid persistent exchange rate misalignments".

It said disorderly exchange rate movements and excess volatility in financial flows could harm economic and financial stability.

(Additional reporting by Gernot Heller, Lesley Wroughton, Maya Dyakina, Tetsushi Kajimoto, Jan Strupczewski, Lidia Kelly, Katya Golubkova, Jason Bush, Anirban Nag and Michael Martina. Writing by Douglas Busvine. Editing by Timothy Heritage/Mike Peacock)

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The Least Annoying Ski Weekend Ever

Lake Tahoe, Calif.
Days: The Ritz-Carlton (MAR), Lake Tahoe, is the nicest hotel on the lake and the closest to the airport (from $ 369 a night). Slopeside at Northstar California (MTN), it offers ski-on, ski-off access, maximizing mountain time. Tahoe is Shaun White’s home resort, and aspiring X Gamers can sign up for the Burton Snowboard Academy near the hotel’s back door ($ 250 for a full-day lesson). For wilderness runs, ride the lifts to Monument Glades.

Après: Take the 15-minute drive to the PlumpJack Squaw Valley Inn, a cozy establishment that attracts pro skiers but is better known for its wine cellar. Too sore to leave the hotel? Book the private chef’s table at the Ritz’s Manzanita and watch as chef Traci Des Jardins prepares a personalized tasting menu (from $ 75 per person).

Tip:
Get a head start on the morning powder by purchasing in advance a “first tracks” ticket for access to the Northstar slopes at 7:30 a.m., an hour and a half before the masses arrive ($ 185, including breakfast; available Feb. 16, 23; March 9, 23).
 
 
Jackson Hole, Wyo.
Days: Upgrade to a mountain view room at the Four Seasons Resort Jackson Hole, a log-and-stone lodge on the edge of Grand Teton National Park ($ 899). In the morning, take the Big Red tram up to Rendezvous Bowl or Tensleep Bowl, some of the best terrain in Jackson Hole (lift ticket, $ 105). Winter is the time to watch Wyoming’s wolves stalk their dinner in the National Elk Refuge. Sign up for an expedition led by the Four Seasons’s wildlife biologist, Tenley Thompson. Guests ride in a luxury SUV equipped with gourmet provisions ($ 199 per adult, $ 99 per child).

Après: Teton Village’s new Wool & Whiskey is part high-end clothing store, part saloon. Up front, shoppers browse clothing by John Varvatos, Filson, and Relwen. In the back, three fingers of Basil Hayden’s Kentucky bourbon poured over chilled soapstones (they don’t dilute it) is available for $ 15. Carb loaders: Get a table at Il Villaggio Osteria for house-made sausage and pastas.

Tip: East Coasters can finally go nonstop: In December, United Airlines (UAL) started offering direct flights from Newark to Jackson Hole.
 
 
Photograph by Michael Friberg for Bloomberg BusinessweekThe Orange Bubble Express at Canyons ResortPark City, Utah
Days: The Waldorf Astoria Park City ($ 179) is at the Canyons Resort, which underwent a major renovation last year. Avoid the trek to a rental in the base village by calling Black Tie Ski Rentals, whose staff will come to your room, fit you for equipment, and deliver boots and skis the next morning ($ 59 a day for the premium package). The hotel is a short gondola ride from the toasty Orange Bubble Express, the first enclosed, heated ski lift in North America (the seats act as butt warmers).

Après: High West Distillery and Saloon is the world’s only ski-in whiskey distillery, located in a 100-year-old livery stable just off Park City’s Main Street. Order the High West Flight ($ 13) for four-ounce pours of craft batches. For dinner, head to the newish Talisker on Main, which offers an outstanding tasting menu featuring local ingredients for about $ 100 a person.

Tip: New Yorkers can catch Friday’s 6:55 a.m. flight out of JFK (about $ 400, one-way) and ski for free by noon using Park City’s Quick Start program. Register at visitparkcity.com/quickstart and bring your voucher and boarding pass to the resort.
 
 
Vail/Beaver Creek, Colo.
Days: The Bavarian-inspired Arrabelle at Vail Square is the friendliest ski resort for smartphone addicts ($ 749). Order room service or book a massage using the hotel’s own app—even the nearby gondola is equipped with Wi-Fi. The ski concierge will have your boots and skis ready first thing in the morning. After a day on the hill, simply ski into the hotel, then head up to the rooftop hot tub. In Beaver Creek, book a room at the Osprey at Beaver Creek ($ 748), the closest hotel to a chairlift in North America: It’s 10 steps from the lobby to the Strawberry Park Express.

Après: If the thin air on the Beaver Creek trails bothers you, stop by the slopeside Ritz-Carlton Moet and Chandon Bubbles Bar, where you can get a 15-minute hit of pure oxygen and some Champagne. Then visit chef Nobu Matsuhisa’s eponymous restaurant, which opened last winter and serves such Japanese-Peruvian dishes as salmon fillet with wasabi pepper ($ 32). The Arrabelle’s SUV will shuttle you back and forth.

Tip: Vail’s EpicMix app uses technology in your lift ticket to track your day. The app lets you compare your time with Lindsey Vonn’s. (You’ll lose.)
 
 
Aspen, Colo.
Days: The 124-year-old Hotel Jerome ($ 695) underwent a total renovation last year. At the spa, experience the Sanctuary of the Mountains, a Ute Indian ritual purification of the hands and feet (80 minutes, $ 225). The Aspen lift ticket ($ 114) grants access to four mountains. After mastering Aspen Mountain’s mellow rollers, move over to Snowmass, where a short hike off the High Alpine lift leads to Headwall’s powdery chutes between banded cliffs.

Après: Don’t feel like dealing with the night lift? Ski to the Oasis, a pop-up Champagne bar on Aspen Mountain’s slopes. It opens at 1 p.m. and has lounge chairs and a solar-powered sound system. Find it on Twitter (@TheLittleNell). In Snowmass, the Viceroy’s Eight K restaurant serves New Orleans-inspired food, such as red snapper with butternut squash puree, black kale, and roasted pecans ($ 33).

Tip: Craft brew lovers stay at Wildwood Snowmass, a hotel that opened last December and features a beer hall by Colorado’s New Belgium Brewing (pints, $ 6).

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Construction Writers Association Call for Speakers- Annual Conference “CONNECTED 2013″ in Chicago

CHICAGO, IL–(Marketwire – Feb 15, 2013) – The Construction Writers Association (CWA) is accepting speaker proposals for the upcoming annual conference — CONNECTED 2013 — that will be held October 21-22, 2013 in Chicago. CWA is celebrating its 55^th anniversary as an association. This is a two-day conference includes the presentation of awards at the Grand Awards Dinner and a construction tour. The deadline to submit speaker proposals is Friday, March 15, 2013.

Potential ideas for submittals are:

• Economic Forecast & Impact-total and by market type


• Engineering-new or current applications and technologies


• Equipment-new or current applications and technologies


• Green Buildings or LEED


• Leadership-brilliant and awesome leaders or visionary concepts


• Marketing Communications-best practices, ideas and visionary concepts


• Media-new innovations or ideas


• Public Relations-best practices, ideas and visionary concepts


• Recycling Ideas-buildings or products


• Roundtable Topics-topics applicable to 20-30 minute sessions


• Social Media-ideas, perceptions, innovative use and practices


• Specific markets: building types, roads, bridges or infrastructure projects


• Top Construction Projects-national and international


• Subjects related to renovation and preservation of historic landmarks


• Safety practices-innovative


• Subjects related to building near bodies of water


• Other topics and idea are welcome

The meeting location will be in downtown Chicago near the Magnificent Mile. Chicago is one of the most beautiful cities in the United States with an abundance of architecture, museums and shopping. Hotel and other conference details will be announced in March.

Speakers should complete the speaker proposal form to provide a brief overview of your proposed idea, speakers and main points of your presentation or program. All sections must be completed at the time of submittal. Send the completed form to CWA at [email protected] by Friday, March 15, 2013. All submittals must state in the email subject line: “2013 Annual Conference Proposal.” 

If you have any questions, contact Deborah J. Hodges, Executive Director, 1-773-687-8726 or Tim Gregorski, 2013 annual conference chair.

For more information about CWA’s annual conference, visit the Events section of the CWA Web site. To join the outstanding sponsors of this event and be recognized as a supporter of journalists, writers, and marketing communicators in the construction industry, contact Deborah Hodges, CWA executive director, for more information at [email protected] or at 1(773) 687-8726.

Join us on LinkedIn at http://www.linkedin.com/groups?mostPopular=&gid=2185694,
Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/groups/78345106861/
and Twitter at https://twitter.com/#!/CWA_Tweets

The Construction Writers Association (CWA), founded in 1958, is a non-profit, non-partisan, international organization that provides a forum for journalism, photography, marketing, and communications professionals in all segments of the construction industry to connect with other professionals and enhance skills through education.

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Beckham must wait before making PSG debut

SAINT-GERMAIN-EN-LAYE, France (AP) — David Beckham will have to wait at least one more week to make his debut for Paris Saint-Germain because his coach says he needs to get in better shape.

Coach Carlo Ancelotti ruled out the 37-year-old former England captain for Sunday's match against Sochaux in the French league.

"He will stay here and work," Ancelotti said Saturday. "He will stay here and improve his physical condition. He still needs to work, and with a week's work he will be ready the following week against Marseille."

PSG hosts title rival Marseille on Feb. 24 and again three days later in the French Cup.

"I think he can play easily against Marseille after one week more training, no problem," Ancelotti said. "I will make the decision whether he starts or not."

Beckham, looking to win a league championship in a fourth country, started full training with PSG this week and has not played since his last appearance for the Los Angeles Galaxy on Dec. 1. He worked out last week in London with personal fitness trainers.

"The level of French football is high, there is a lot of rhythm, a lot of intensity," Ancelotti said, adding he plans to use Beckham either in a defensive central midfield role or out wide on the right.

"He brings his experience, his quality, his professionalism. These are the things we need from David," said Ancelotti, who is close to Beckham after coaching him at AC Milan. "I'm not just keeping him for the Cup or the Champions League. He can play in every match."

Entering this weekend's matches, PSG leads Lyon by six points and Marseille by eight.

"We are in very good form at the moment," Ancelotti said, referring to PSG's unbeaten start to the year.

PSG took a step toward reaching the Champions League quarterfinals by winning 2-1 at Valencia this week.

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How Carnival can clean up PR mess

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• David Bartlett: For Carnival, impact of 'cruise from hell' potentially devastating.


• Passenger video, media puts Carnival increasingly on the defensive, he says


• He says it must show real concern, lay out plan, go a long way to make amends


• Don't try to justify or explain, he says, but get proactive now about fixing problem

Editor's note: David Bartlett is a senior vice president of Levick, a crisis and issues management and strategic communications firm based in Washington. He is the author of "Making Your Point" (St. Martin's Press), a guide to communication strategy and tactics.

(CNN) -- As three tugboats towed the disabled Carnival cruise ship Triumph back to port in Mobile, Alabama, things went from bad to worse.

The fire that caused the ship to lose power and drift aimlessly on rough Gulf of Mexico swells was just the beginning. Raw sewage seeped into corridors and cabin ways. Food had to be rationed. There were fears of looting. Not surprisingly, passengers were furious and emotional. Some were reported to be "acting like savages."

For Carnival and the rest of the cruise line industry, the implications are potentially devastating. The deadly capsizing in January 2012 of the Costa Concordia ship off the coast of Italy still lingers in the public's mind. About a month later, the Costa Allegra liner suffered a similar engine fire, lost power, and was set adrift in pirate-infested waters in the Indian Ocean. Carnival owns Costa Cruises, and now a third high-profile crisis for Carnival in just over a year threatens to cement the perception among vacationers that cruising might not be worth the risk.

Five things we've learned about cruises

David Bartlett

In the age of social and digital media, the problems faced by cruise lines are compounded. Using mobile phones, passengers aboard the Triumph have been providing concerned family members with constant updates. Those enraged family members have immediately passed the horror stories along to the eager media. The public is getting the full play-by-play in virtual real time, leaving Carnival playing catchup from an increasingly defensive posture.

But as bad as the potential damage to Carnival's image may be, the company, as well as the rest of the cruise line industry, has an opportunity to blunt the impact, if it acts quickly and wisely.

It seems counterintuitive, but while the gruesome stories of the "cruise from hell" are still fresh, the crisis offers an opportunity for the cruise line to make a compelling statement about the industry's commitment to its passengers. (Statements from Carnival.)

Crisis management experts know that customers and the general public are more likely to judge an organization by how it handles a problem than how it got into the problem in the first place. That means Carnival has to go much further than mere reimbursements and vouchers for onward travel.

The challenge to Carnival's reputation is three-fold.

First the company must articulate real concern for passengers and clearly communicate what it is doing to make things right for customers. This will require financial sacrifices, of course. But Carnival has little choice but to pay now and win some badly needed goodwill -- or pay later in the courtroom, in the court of public opinion, and, of course, at the cash register when bookings decline.

Second, the company must clearly communicate what it is doing to fix the problem and prevent anything like it from ever happening again. How did an engine fire, serious as that might be, so quickly develop into a disaster of this magnitude?

My celebration trip on the Carnival Triumph: From joy to misery

How could it have been allowed to happen? Why was the widely reported chaos and disorder allowed to develop? Why did Carnival not have emergency response plans in place? What is the industry doing to prepare for what would seem to be a manageable situation? The public will demand answers to these basic questions before it will begin to trust again. Uncertainty breathes life into a crisis. Accurate and timely information smothers it.

Third, Carnival must aggressively and clearly deliver these messages now, and for as long as it takes to restore the public's trust.

So far, the story has been about the unthinkable conditions the passengers have been forced to endure. Carnival must move aggressively to reshape that narrative to reflect all that it is doing to rectify the situation.

After a bad cruise, can you cruise into court?

Carnival has to resist the temptation to explain, minimize, or justify what happened and position itself instead as part of the solution to the problems that caused the disaster. That is what the public will focus on and remember, but only if Carnival is able to communicate it fast and effectively.

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The opinions in this commentary are solely those of David Bartlett.

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Work starts on Seaside Heights, NJ, boardwalk

SEASIDE HEIGHTS, N.J. (AP) — The sounds shaking the ground in Seaside Heights aren’t from nightclubs.

The town featured in the MTV reality show “Jersey Shore” has started rebuilding the boardwalk that was destroyed by Superstorm Sandy.

Heavy equipment began drilling holes in the sand and pounding pilings into the ground Friday. It’s the first phase of a project that could ultimately cost $ 6 million to $ 7 million.

Mayor Bill Akers says the mile-long walkway should be done by May 10, but amenities like railings, lighting and ramps will come after that.

Many residents turned out to see the start of the work. They expressed hope that the place where they vacationed as children and came to settle down will recapture what made it so special to them.

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Wall Street edges up on data, S&P up for seventh week

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks rose slightly Friday with the S&P 500 gaining for a seventh week in the wake of upbeat consumer sentiment data, though thin trading and the modest rise showed a continuing trend of a consolidating market after strong recent gains.

The S&P 500, up nearly 7 percent so far this year, is facing strong technical resistance near the 1,525 level. But investors, expecting the index to advance further in the quarter, have held back from locking in profits.

The Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan's preliminary reading on the overall index of consumer sentiment rose to 76.3 in February from 73.8 in January, topping economists' forecasts of 74.8.

"This is unexpected given the increase in gas prices and payroll taxes," said Jim Awad, managing director at Zephyr Management in New York. "This is a welcome event and it should be embraced by the market."

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> rose 14.51 points or 0.1 percent, to 13,987.9, the S&P 500 <.spx> gained 1.44 points or 0.09 percent, to 1,522.82 and the Nasdaq Composite <.ixic> added 4.68 points or 0.15 percent, to 3,203.34.

The S&P is on track to register its seventh straight week of gains by the close of trading Friday, a feat not seen since a run of consecutive weekly gains between December 2010 and January 2011.

A surge in merger and acquisition activity, with more than $158 billion in deals announced so far in 2013, has given further support to the equity market as it points to healthy valuations and bets on the economic outlook.

Art Hogan, managing director of Lazard Capital Markets in New York, said the flurry of mergers and acquisitions should be seen as a tailwind for the market.

"You don't go into M&A if you don't have a positive outlook," he said.

Herbalife shares surged 10 percent to $42.12 a day after billionaire investor Carl Icahn said in a regulatory filing that he now owns 13 percent of Herbalife and was ready to put it in play.

Burger King Worldwide shares jumped 3.8 percent to $17.21 after it beat estimates with a 94 percent rise in fourth-quarter profit, thanks to new menu additions.

(Additional reporting by Ryan Vlastelica; Editing by Bernadette Baum)

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Wall Street opens flat with data on tap

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Wall Street opened flat on Friday, continuing a trend this week of thin trading and tight moves, with the S&P 500 struggling to extend a streak of weekly gains to seven.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> shed 0.62 points, or 0.00 percent, to 13,972.77. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index <.spx> gained 1.24 points, or 0.08 percent, to 1,522.62. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> added 5.10 points, or 0.16 percent, to 3,203.76.</.ixic></.spx></.dji>

(Reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Bernadette Baum)

Business News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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