Toys ‘R’ Us to close 182 Kids ‘R’ Us stores

Toy and children’s retailer Toys “R” Us Inc. said its third-quarter loss widened due to higher overhead and stagnant sales, and announced plans to close 182 Kids “R” Us and Imaginarium stores, cutting up to 3,800 U.S. jobs.

The loss reported Monday by the nation’s No. 2 toy retailer behind Wal-Mart Stores Inc. was larger than expected, and Toys “R” Us lowered its earnings forecast.

The company will close all 146 of its freestanding Kids “R” Us clothing stores, like the one pictured above in Lawrenceville, N.J., by Jan. 31. It also will shutter all 36 freestanding Imaginarium stores, which feature educational toys, and three distribution centers that serve those divisions. That amounts to 11 percent of its 1,629 stores worldwide.

Acquisition

Insurance merger slated

Travelers Property Casualty Corp. is combining with The St. Paul Cos. Inc. in a $16.5 billion stock deal that will create the nation’s second-largest business insurer.

The new company will be known as The St. Paul Travelers Cos. and is expected to have total assets of $107 billion, the companies announced Monday.

The deal mixes Travelers’ strength in general commercial insurance and personal insurance with The St. Paul’s specialty commercial lines of insurance.

The only larger business insurer would be American International Group.

Economy

Business inventories rise

America’s businesses — which have been keeping supplies fairly lean — boosted their stockpiles of unsold goods in September for the first time in six months, a sign that companies may be feeling more confident about the economic recovery.

The Commerce Department reported Monday that businesses’ inventories rose by 0.3 percent in September, a turnaround from the 0.4 percent drop reported in August. September’s rise was the first since March, when businesses also increased their supplies at warehouses and backlots by 0.3 percent.

Economists were expecting inventories to be flat in September.

Telecommunications

10 percent of work force at Verizon takes buyout

Verizon Communications Inc. said Monday about 21,600 employees — almost 10 percent of its work force — accepted an early-retirement buyout offer as it cuts costs to offset weak local phone sales.

The work force reduction is one of the largest in any U.S. industry this year and comes less than a month after economic data showed the biggest surge in U.S. growth in 19 years, fanning expectations that businesses could begin adding to payrolls.

Verizon, the No. 1 U.S. telephone company, will take a “significant” charge in the fourth quarter to cover the cost of the buyouts, Vice Chairman Larry Babbio said at the UBS Eighth Annual Global Communications Conference in New York.

Of the 21,600 workers accepting the buyout, about 5,600 are union employees and the rest are management workers, Verizon said.