Deals & Developments

No More Bananas. Directors of the $25,000,000-in-assets Atlantic Fruit & Sugar Co. are: Samuel F. Pryor of Remington Arms Co.; lanky Vincent Astar; Frederick Baldwin Adams, chairman of Air Reduction Co. and member of the executive committee of U. S. Industrial Alcohol; Percy Avery Rockefeller; Socialite Robert Walton Goelet of Newport; Henry Osborne Havemeyer, also a director of Chase, Kennecott, and International Match; George Herbert Walker, director of American International Corp. and Barnsdall Corp.; Francis Minot Weld, also on the board of Baldwin Locomotive and Central Hanover Bank & Trust Co.; Guy Gary, a director of National City Bank.

Formed in 1924 after old Atlantic Fruit Co. had been foreclosed, the company lost money in every succeeding year. Last week it suddenly announced it had disposed of its $6,000,000-a-year fruit business (bananas in Jamaica and Cuba) to Standard Fruit & Steamship Corp., controlled by the Vaccaro interests of New Orleans. With the sugar industry in bad shape, with its current liabilities greater than current assets as last reported, Atlantic Fruit & Sugar seemed on the verge of another reorganization despite its imposing directorate.

Out of Court. Suit and countersuit between Gillette Safety Razor Co. and United Cigar Stores Co. were settled out of court last week. Gillette had charged that United had exaggerated its ability to sell razors and blades, claimed $10,000,000 damages were due. United brought a $7,000,000 countersuit for breach of contract. The extra-legal settlement provided for a $1,900,000 payment by Gillette and the resumption of business relations. But existing contracts are cancelled. At the end of last year Gillette had $4,212,000 in cash.

Resinox. For several years Corn Products Refining Co. has been experimenting with a rubberish byproduct, contemplated forming a separate company to develop it. It found that Commercial Solvents Corp. had a wholly owned subsidiary, Resinox Corp., whose research was along the same lines. Last week Corn Products announced it had bought "a substantial interest" in Resinox, would pool data on synthetic resins. This is not the first liaison between the two companies: George Monroe Moffett is president of Corn Products, director of Commercial Solvents. Commercial Solvents sells corn by-products to Corn Products. And Corn Products is rumored to own 100,000 shares of Solvents.

Suit. Aluminum Co. of America faced a $9,000,000 damage suit last week, filed by its customer Baush Machine Tool Co. of Springfield, Mass. Loudest complaint was that Aluminum Co. gave Baush's competitors price concessions.

Contract. Between 75 and 90 of the gasoline requirements of Richfield Oil Corp. of New York (solvent) will be filled by Arkansas Natural Gas Corp., Cities Service unit, according to a contract signed last week. Cities Service was expected to absorb Richfield Oil Co. of California after it went into receivership (TIME, Feb. 9), is still thought to hold much Richfield stock.

For Men. There is no depression in the celluloid collar business. At least that was the opinion uttered last week by H. F. Gilmour, head of Stake Manufacturing Co. of Lincoln, Neb., one of the three U. S. concerns in the business. Reason for his cheer: a 250-doz. order from Africa.

As yet no statement has appeared on the 1931 earnings of the ancient (incorporated: 1866) Reversible Collar Co. of Boston. Although Reversible Collar has added surface-coated and cloth-lined paper to its lines of reversible cuffs, collars and fronts, last year's profits were $22,000 against $49,000 in 1929.

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