U.S. markets turn higher Wednesday

NEW YORK, Sept. 9 (UPI) -- U.S. stock indexes turned higher Wednesday morning, despite a record drop in consumer credit in July.

The U.S. Federal Reserve said Tuesday that consumer credit dropped by $26.1 billion in July with a $6.1 billion decline in revolving debt and a $15.4 billion fall in non-revolving debt.

Despite the pull back from borrowing, the Dow Jones industrial average added 69.61 points, 0.73 percent, to 9,566.95 in late morning trading. The Standard & Poor's 500 rose 0.85 percent, 8.73 points, to 1,034.12. The Nasdaq index gained 1.21 percent, 24.66 points, to 2,062.43.

The benchmark 10-year Treasury fell 7/32 to yield 3.505 percent.

The euro rose to $1.4585 from Tuesday's $1.4499. Against the yen, the dollar fell to 91.68 yen from Tuesday's 92.23 yen.

In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 index lost 0.78 percent, 81.09 points, to 10,312.14.

Feds to sell Madoff properties

NEW YORK, Sept. 9 (UPI) -- Federal authorities are selling New York and Florida properties belonging to convicted Ponzi scheme operator Bernard Madoff to compensate his fraud victims.

Real estate appraisers said Madoff's properties were surprisingly modest considering the size of his investment fraud.

Madoff pleaded guilty in March to running a Ponzi scheme that some estimate defrauded investors of $65 billion.

While Madoff is in jail serving a 150-year sentence, officials are preparing to sell his beachfront property in Montauk, Long Island, his New York City penthouse and his home in Palm Beach, Fla., CNNMoney.com reported Wednesday.

"From what I've seen, I'd call it a fairly modest place," New York appraiser Jonathan Miller said of Madoff's two-story New York penthouse.

Barry Golden of the U.S. Marshals South District Florida office said "there was nothing over the top about it," referring to Madoff's home in Palm Beach.

"It's just another $8 million or $9 million property in the town of Palm Beach," said Palm Beach County Director of Residential Appraisal John Thomas.

Each home was expected to bring in between $7 million and $10 million. In addition, federal authorities were drumming up interest in Madoff's boats.

"We hope to keep the prices up so we can return the maximum amount of money to the victims," Golden said.

Google finds opposition in copyright case

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., Sept. 9 (UPI) -- A court filing shows that U.S. technology firm Google Inc. has yet to appease stakeholders concerned with privacy guarantees in a global copyright debate.

Google, involved in a book scanning project involving millions of books, has said it would fund a Book Registry with $125 million that would compensate European authors and publishers with a base fee and 63 percent of future revenue generated from use of copyrighted material, the San Francisco Chronicle reported Wednesday.

Google also said it would not offer books that were out of print in the United States, but still available commercially in Europe without first negotiating permission to do so.

But the massive book scanning project has garnered international criticism. The European Commission held a hearing on the plan and the U.S. Department of Justice is probing the deal on anti-trust concerns.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation, the American Civil Liberties Union and several other groups filed a brief objecting to Google's privacy policy.

The brief says the policy "fails to safeguard reader privacy."

Google has said it would allow "protections to limit the information (such as book titles) available to credit card companies about book purchases, and to enable (users) to delete or disassociate the titles of books purchased from your Google Account," the Chronicle reported.

Palm unveils a smaller phone

SAN JOSE, Calif., Sept. 9 (UPI) -- U.S. tech innovator Palm unveiled its newest smartphone Wednesday, the Pixi -- slimmer than the Pre and geared toward youth, reviewers said.

The Pixi features a smaller touchscreen than the Pre, a full QWERTY keyboard and a 2-megapixel camera, Cnetnews.com reported.

The 3.5 ounce phone includes 8GB of memory and a global positioning system. But, lacking Wi-Fi capability, "the Pixi is aimed at a tweener set who probably won't use these features as much as older, more business-minded users," PCWorld reported.

Palm released details of the phone without mentioning a price, but used the occasion to announce a new price for the Pre, which it introduced four months ago.

The new Pre price is $150 with a two-year Sprint service agreement, Cnetnews.com reported.

"With Palm WebOS, we're creating a new, more intuitive smartphone experience defined by unmatched simplicity and usefulness," Jon Rubinstein, Palm chairman and chief executive officer, said in a statement.

"Palm Pixi brings this unique experience to a broader range of people who want enhanced messaging and social networking in a design that lets them express their personal style," Rubinstein said.

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