Mortgage rates rise

Rates on 30-year and 15-year mortgages inched up this week, ending a three-week stretch in which rates had moved down.

Even with the uptick, rates still are sufficiently low to keep the housing market healthy, economists said.

The average rate on 30-year mortgages rose to 5.85 percent this week, up slightly from 5.81 percent last week, Freddie Mac, the mortgage giant, reported Wednesday in its weekly nationwide survey of mortgage rates.

For 15-year mortgages, a popular option for refinancing, rates increased to 5.15 percent this week, up from 5.13 percent the previous week.

Aviation

Boeing wins $1 billion contract extension

NASA said on Wednesday it had granted the Boeing Co. a contract extension for work on the International Space Station worth at least $1 billion.

The extension has a basic period of two years and nine months and an estimated value of $1 billion, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration said.

It also contains four six-month options that if fully exercised would bring the total contract value to $1.62 billion, NASA said.

The contract calls for Boeing to provide and maintain hardware and software for the space station and to manage most of its subsystems such as materials, electrical parts, environments and electromagnetic effects, the space agency said.

NASA said the extension was part of a restructuring of space station contracts to consolidate work and increase efficiency and accountability.

International

Dollar closes year at new low to euro

The dollar continued to tread on a downward path Wednesday as the euro shot above $1.26, notching the latest in a string of record highs against the battered U.S. currency.

The 12-nation European currency, which has risen more than 20 percent against the dollar this year, reached $1.2647. It eased to $1.2572 in late New York trading, up from $1.2549 late Tuesday.

“Fundamentals still require the dollar to fall and a floor on that process has yet to emerge,” said Peter Morici, professor of international business at the University of Maryland.

The release of lower jobless claims figures — the lowest in nearly three years — indicated that America’s businesses were more confident that the economic recovery was genuine. But the news was shrugged off by a market preoccupied with the U.S. budget and trade deficits.

Investigation

Parmalat probe widens

Parmalat’s Enron-like scandal ballooned Wednesday with the detention of seven more company officials and auditors, and revelations in a document obtained by The Associated Press that one executive of the Italian dairy giant ordered that a computer used to falsify documents be smashed with a hammer.

Prosecutors also began investigating whether officials from Bank of America Corp. may have been involved in the scandal, the Italian news agencies ANSA and APcom reported, citing Parma prosecutors. The agencies said three Bank of America lawyers were in Parma awaiting a meeting with prosecutors.

There was no confirmation from prosecutors.

“We continue to fully cooperate with all authorities,” said Bank of America spokeswoman Betsy Weinberger in Charlotte, N.C.