Companies

Chris Paine is a filmmaker whose documentaries include "Who Killed the Electric Car?" ,"Charge" and "Revenge of the Electric Car. " The troubles of electric-car-maker Fisker Automotive have fueled another round of debate about whether plug-ins can live up to their promises. The California start-up, which had already halted production and laid off most of its employees, missed a federal loan payment Monday and told a congressional hearing on Wednesday that bankruptcy may be unavoidable . This is likely the end of the road...

The past year brought continued financial woes for small businesses across a wide array of industries — but not all of them. In a select few sectors, business is booming and sales expectations are soaring heading into 2013. Small agricultural companies and heavy-duty manufacturers are primed for some of the most rapid growth in the coming months, according to a new report from Sageworks based on financial data from thousands of firms with annual revenue below $10 million.

About 300 engineers, financiers and consultants filled a hotel conference room Wednesday to learn how they might help build — and profit from — a $2.15 billion light-rail Purple Line through the Maryland suburbs. Maryland transit officials are seeking ideas from private companies for ways to finance a 16-mile transit link between Bethesda and New Carrollton with limited public funds. State officials said having a consortium of companies invest in designing and building the line, while also being...

U.S. Special Operations forces rescued an American hostage and her Danish colleague in Somalia early Wednesday in the kind of daring raid that the Obama administration has said will be the hallmark of future U.S. military missions. Officials said the raid, by members of the Navy SEAL Team 6 unit that killed Osama bin Laden in May, demonstrated President Obama's focus on the narrow, targeted use of force after a decade of large-scale military deployments. The mission is "yet...

Illegal immigrants could obtain Maryland driver's licenses under a measure the General Assembly sent to Gov. Martin O'Malley on Friday, and that aides said the governor supports. The measure , which passed the House of Delegates 82 to 55, would reinstate and expand a program that allowed some immigrants to obtain licenses prior to 2009, when it was ended so Maryland could conform to a stricter, federal rule on IDs. Maryland lawmakers, however, voted to repeal that...

When someone in the Washington area begins to type the president's last name into the search box of Google's home page, the top three terms it suggests as the most popular selections are Obama, Obamacare and . . . Obama phone. Obama phone? A hotline, maybe, to the Oval Office? Hardly. "Obama phone" is the widely used — and misleading — nickname of a 28-year-old federal program known as Lifeline . It provides discounts, averaging $9.25 a month, on phone service for...

T here I was, in the middle of the Rocky Mountains, looking down at the Colorado River. Animal tracks in the snow made a dotted line beside the water. But where, I wondered, were the bighorn sheep? The black bears? I pressed my nose to the glass and followed the tracks carefully, expecting — any second now — to see wildlife. I was in my 40th hour aboard Amtrak , nearly 2,000 miles into a 3,218-mile cross-country adventure. I'd packed five books, my laptop, several movies and hours of...

When Stefan and Jennifer Hull beat out other interested buyers for a four-bedroom, two-bathroom Cape Cod house in Bethesda, they felt sure they'd gotten a bargain at $759,200. They were shocked when their lender's appraiser valued the home at only $744,000. Because of the low appraisal, their bank would only give them a $595,200 mortgage, instead of the $607,360 they'd been approved for initially. The Hulls said they didn't believe the home was worth the lower appraisal amount — it turned...

The battle has been going on since at least the 1880s, when the first New England textile mills began moving production to the Carolinas. Whatever name it goes by — "runaway plants," "outsourcing," "global sourcing," "offshoring"— workers and the public tend to hate it, executives view it as inevitable and economists defend it as part of the painful process by which market economies prosper. Now, President Obama and his election-year rival, Mitt Romney , have...

NEW YORK — Cisco's net income jumped 14 percent in the latest quarter as revenue at all four of its divisions rose for the first time in a year and a half. Cisco earned $2.5 billion, or 46 cents per share, in its fiscal third quarter, which ended April 27. That's up from $2.2 billion, or 40 cents per share, a year ago. Excluding one-time items Cisco earned 51 cents per share in the latest quarter, and its revenue increased 5 percent, to $12.2 billion from $11.6...

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A jury on Wednesday convicted the founder of a Kansas City company and four associates of cheating investors by selling them millions of dollars of worthless stock and spending the money on themselves. Petro America Corp. founder Isreal Owen Hawkins and his associates were accused of illegally selling unregistered stock in Petro America from 2008 through 2010, much of it to poor investors. Prosecutors said investors were told the company had $284...

The European Union's executive arm, the Commission, on Tuesday said it had raided the offices of a number of oil industry companies for possible price-fixing. Here are some questions and answers on the investigation. — Which companies were raided and why? The EU Commission did not say which companies it is investigating. However, some firms have confirmed they are part of the probe. They include Britain's BP, Royal Dutch Shell, which is listed in London and...

ENERGY Price-fixing probe targets 3 oil firms European antitrust authorities have launched investigations into at least three oil companies on suspicion of price-fixing. Britain's BP, Royal Dutch Shell and Norway's Statoil confirmed that they are subjects of the inquiry announced Tuesday by the European Union's executive arm, the European Commission. Statoil said a raid at its headquarters in Stavanger, Norway, was carried out with the assistance of Norwegian...

NEW YORK — The stock market is back in record territory after an upturn in small-company stocks. A survey released Tuesday by the National Federation of Independent Business found that small business owners were slightly more optimistic in April. That helped send the Russell 2000 index of small company stocks up 1.3 percent, more than other market indexes. The Dow Jones industrial average rose 123 points to close at 15,215 Tuesday, a gain of 0.8 percent. It was the 18th straight...

One-hundred-thirty members of Congress or their families have traded stocks collectively worth hundreds of millions of dollars in companies lobbying on bills that came before their committees, a practice that is permitted under current ethics rules, a Washington Post analysis has found. The lawmakers bought and sold a total of between $85 million and $218 million in 323 companies registered to lobby on legislation that appeared before them, according to an examination of all 45,000...

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg generated international attention last week for his entry into Washington politics. In launching a new political group, he positioned himself as a leading advocate to help aspiring entrepreneurs and other ambitious immigrants achieve the American dream. Yet behind the scenes on Capitol Hill, Facebook lobbyists were engaged in another form of politics: pressing to insert a few new words helpful to Facebook's...