Patricia Dunn resigns as HP chairwoman
Palo Alto: Patricia Dunn Hewlett-Packard's chairwoman has stepped down from the board of the company as her efforts to stop a media leak turned into a spying scandal. Hewlett Packard will now have as its chairman its earlier chief executive, Mark Hurd, who was supposed to take over the job that job in January as part of a realignment announced two weeks ago. Dunn had previously planned to remain an HP director after leaving the of chairman in January, but now she will leave the board entirely.

Dunn continued to defend her decision to initiate the probe to identify the boardroom leak and reiterated her intention to appear Thursday before a congressional panel looking into HP's spying spree.

Earlier determined to protect confidential board discussions, Dunn hired investigators who impersonated board members, employees and journalists to obtain their phone records. The detectives also put surveillance on an HP director and also sent a concocted e-mail to dupe a reporter for CNet Networks Inc.'s News.com, an online technology site.
Back to News Review index page  

Amaranth not to shut shop
Amaranth Advisors LLC, the hedge- fund company that lost $6 billion betting on natural-gas prices, does not plan to shut shop the fund's founder Nicholas Maounis told investors.

However the hedge fund now has about $3.5 billion in assets has not yet decided how to handle clients' requests for their money.

Amaranth, based in Greenwich, Connecticut, this week sold its energy trades and other investments to avoid being shut down by creditors after its two main funds plunged 65 per cent since the end of August. The firm has been in talks to sell a stake to Citigroup Inc., the largest U.S. bank, which wants to expand its hedge-fund business. Amaranth is the largest hedge fund to be hit by bad bets since Long-Term Capital Management LP in 1998. Hedge funds are private partnerships catering to rich investors and institutions.

They endeavor to profit regardless of how financial markets fare. There are more than 8,000 hedge funds with $1.2 trillion in assets, according to Hedge Fund Research Inc. in Chicago.
Back to News Review index page