Energy price decline helps consumer prices

WASHINGTON -- Consumer prices, helped by a second monthly drop in energy costs, were well behaved in January, but a weaker dollar and increases in crude oil prices this month could mean trouble ahead. The Labor Department reported Wednesday that its Consumer Price Index edged up a tiny 0.1 percent in January after having been frozen with no change in December. Both months were helped by big declines in energy costs, but that situation is expected to reverse in February and March as a rebound in world crude oil prices hits American consumers.

Martha Stewart firm sees fourth-quarter fall

NEW YORK -- Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia Inc., whose founder will be released from prison next week, turned in a loss during its fourth quarter, compared with a profit a year ago, as it continues to be dragged down by declining magazine advertising revenues, and softness in its television division. The New York-based multimedia company, which stamps the namesake domestic diva's name on an array of products from magazines to pots, also warned Wednesday that losses for the first quarter will be larger than what analysts expected.

Fed policymakers say rates may still be low

WASHINGTON -- Federal Reserve policymakers suggested that despite six boosts, short-term interest rates may still be too low to keep inflation from becoming a problem. The pace of any future increases, though, would depend on the unfolding economic climate, according to minutes of the Fed's February meeting released Wednesday. Fed chairman Alan Greenspan and his colleagues pushed up a key short-term interest rate by one-quarter percentage point to 2.5 percent at that meeting Feb. 1 and 2. It marked the sixth quarter-point increase since the Fed embarked on its rate-raising campaign in June 2004.