The St. Joe Company (JOE), a publicly held operationally diverse real estate company, has recently sold its property in Perico Island, Florida for about $8 million to Minto Communities LLC, the U.S. subsidiary of the Canadian real estate company Minto Group Inc.   St. Joe had earlier halted work on the 684-unit residential condo project on the island as substantial units were not sold to warrant construction. Furthermore, St. Joe had also completed a corporate reorganization and exited the home building business during the third quarter of 2006. Consequently, the company decided to get rid of its Perico Island property.  Initial infrastructure of the project has already been put in place, including a 32-acre man-made lake. The Minto Group plans to continue the development work on the island in 2010. Minto Communities had built approximately 19,000 homes across Southeast Florida and the recent acquisition is the largest ...

Southern Telecom, the telecommunications subsidiary of Southern Company (SO), has recently signed an agreement with the Florida-based 421 West Church Street to connect its Atlanta, Macon and Jacksonville metro dark fiber networks to the latter’s carrier neutral telecommunication facility. This will help Southern Telecom to expand its presence in the Southeast region as well as to offer better service to its existing customers.  Southern Telecom provides long-haul and metro dark fiber connecting Atlanta with other smaller cities throughout the Southeast region. The company also offers HVAC, power and other custom energy solutions for optronics at its operation hubs and in-line amplification sites on the long-haul routes and points of presence in the metro areas supporting the metro fiber rings.  Shares of Southern Company closed at $31.44 on Tuesday, trading at 13.7X trailing 12-month earnings per share versus 11.8X of the peer group. We maintain our Neutral recommendation ...

Mid-America Apartment Communities Inc. (MAA), a self-administered and self-managed real estate investment trust (REIT), recently announced the retirement of its CFO Simon Wadsworth as part of the long-term succession-planning program.

The company’s Executive Vice President, Treasurer and Director of Financial Planning Albert Campbell will replace Simon Wadsworth. Campbell joined Mid-America Apartment in 1998 as Vice President of Financial Planning and was later promoted to Senior Vice President and Treasurer of the company in 2003.

Mid-America Apartment owns and manages apartments in the Sunbelt region of the U.S. The company defines its portfolio in two tiers– primary markets and secondary markets. Having a diversified presence in diverse markets helps mitigate risk and decreases volatility in the event of a slowdown in any one product type.

Primary markets are relatively larger in size compared to secondary markets. On the other hand, secondary markets often have stable fundamentals due to limited

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Winn-Dixie Stores Inc. (WINN) reported fiscal fourth-quarter results earlier this week. The company swung to a net profit of $9.4 million from a net loss of $5.5 million in the year-ago quarter. Earnings per share came in at 17 cents, which missed the Zacks Consensus Estimate by a penny. Winn-Dixie is one of the leading food retailers in the U.S. and currently operates 515 grocery locations, including more than 400 in-store pharmacies, across Florida, Alabama, Louisiana, Georgia and Mississippi. The Jacksonville, FL-based company’s sales posted a slight growth of 1.4% year over year to $1.72 billion. This was driven by a 1.6% rise in identical-store sales, mainly due to a favorable shift in the timing of Easter holidays, partially offset by higher sales of generic drugs compared to branded ones. The company, which emerged from bankruptcy protection in November 2006, is remodeling its stores in the ...

The first of the major railroads, a href="http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=csx"CSX/a, a href="http://finance.yahoo.com/news/CSX-2Q-profit-falls-20-apf-3069938868.html?x=0amp;.v=8"reported last night/a. I like to look to railroads for a accurate representation of the broad economy, and CSX beat expectations. br /br /span style="font-weight: bold;"-Railroad operator CSX said Monday that second-quarter earnings fell 20 percent as it collected fewer fuel surcharges and shipments continued to drop./spanbr /br /span style="font-weight: bold;"-The results still topped Wall Street's expectations, as the company slashed expenses by 27 percent./spanbr /br /span style="font-weight: bold;"-The Jacksonville, Fla.-based company, which runs its signature blue and yellow locomotives from Canada to Florida and west to the Mississippi River, said Monday it earned $308 million, or 78 cents per share, compared with $385 million, or 93 cents a share, last year./spanbr /br /span style="font-weight: bold;"-Revenue fell 25 percent to $2.19 billion./spanbr /br /span style="font-weight: bold;"-CSX's shipping volume fell 21 percent in the period, compared with 22 percent industrywide. ...

Liberator Medical Holdings, Inc. announced this morning that it has formed a new division to meet the educational needs of millions in the United States. The new Diabetes Self-Management Program is being led by industry veteran Evelyn P. Schumacher, MS, RD, CDE, who has agreed to serve as Vice-President of the new division, Liberator Health and Education Services, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Liberator Medical Holdings, Inc.

Ms. Schumacher has more than ten years of experience in diabetes education as a registered dietitian and a certified diabetes educator. Ms. Schumacher has served as Program Coordinator/Educator for Shands Jacksonville and also served as Diabetes Educator for Baker, Nassau and Duval Counties in Florida. Additionally, Ms. Schumacher served as a speaker for GlaxoSmithKline, Bayer Healthcare, Novartis, Eli Lilly and Co, and Sanofi-Aventis. Currently, she serves as President of the Jacksonville Association of Diabetes Educators and Chair of the American Association of

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Fidelity National Financial Inc. (FNF) shares slumped on Tuesday after the title insurer said it plans to make a public offering of 13.30 million shares of its common stock.

The Jacksonville, Florida-based company intends to use proceeds from the offering for general corporate purposes, including the possibility of repaying debt under its $1.1 billion syndicated credit contract.

Fidelity's debt burden had increased when it bought three units of bankrupt rival LandAmerica Financial Group Inc. last December. The company has granted underwriters the option to buy up to 2 million additional shares.

As the offering would further dilute the troubled insurer's earnings, shareholders sent the stock down nearly 11% to $20.15 at noon on the New York Stock Exchange. Fidelity National shares had touched an intraday low of $19.68 earlier in the session.

"FNF" Free Stock Analysis: Buy? Sell? Hold?Zacks ...

The St. Joe Company (JOE), a publicly held, operationally diverse real estate company, is based in Jacksonville, Florida. It is one of Florida's largest real estate developers.Operations are getting worse at JOE. The company reported a net loss of $27.9 million or ($0.31) per share in 4Q08. 4Q earnings included impairments and write downs of $0.34 per share. While operations continue to deteriorate, the company is currently focused on maintaining liquidity and cutting expenses.In addition, JOE has repaid most of its long-term debt and the company has sufficient cash reserves to get through the residential real estate slump. Although, there are no signs that the housing situation will get better in the next six months, and the worst could be yet to come.Near term, we would stay away from companies with exposure to the residential building business. While we think the company ...

Fidelity National Financial Inc (FNF) shares are experiencing unusually high trading volume. The Jacksonville-based company's stock jumped over 6% at noon.

Zacks Investment Research

Euro gains, then loses, then gains…  Inflation and Commodities…  The euro turns 10!  Risk Aversion remains but is waning… And Now… Today’s Pfennig! Remember those Wild Swings I talked about yesterday? The Wild Swings that could be a result of thin volumes in this the second week of Christmas. Well… We witnessed them in earnest yesterday! As I signed off yesterday, I told you that the euro had rallied 2 whole figures to 1.43 and change. Well, that rally dissipated throughout the morning, and by late in the day the single unit was 1.39 and change… WOW! Now that’s a Wild Swing!

You can point to profit taking as the reason for the move,

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