Home Depot sales set four-year record

More attention to customer service and technology upgrades helped Home Depot post its best quarterly gain in same-store sales in four years and a 22 percent gain in profits in the third quarter.

The results, announced Tuesday, beat Wall Street expectations.

Atlanta-based Home Depot said it earned $1.15 billion, or 50 cents a share, for the three months ending Nov. 2, compared with a profit of $940 million, or 40 cents a share, for the same period a year ago.

Economy

Consumer prices steady

Consumer prices were flat in October as a sharp drop in the costs of gasoline and other energy products offset the biggest jump in beef and veal prices seen in 24 years.

The Labor Department’s latest reading Tuesday on the Consumer Price Index, the government’s most closely watched inflation barometer, showed that overall consumer prices eased last month after rising by 0.3 percent in both August and September.

The flat reading on the CPI in October came after four straight months of price increases. Economists were expecting a tiny 0.1 percent increase in overall prices.

Freight carriers

Yellow-Roadway deal clears regulatory hurdle

The waiting period required under the antitrust Hart-Scott-Rodino law has expired regarding trucking giant Yellow Corp.’s proposed acquisition of rival Roadway Corp., Yellow announced Tuesday.

Overland Park-based Yellow has agreed to buy Roadway for $966 million in cash and stock. Yellow and Roadway, based in Akron, Ohio, are less-than-truckload carriers, meaning they consolidate freight from multiple customers. Zollars has said they would continue to compete with each other.

If the deal goes through, Yellow-Roadway would control more than 15 percent of the less-than-truckload market.