Kodak in $525 million patent deal, eyes bankruptcy end

(Reuters) – Eastman Kodak Co agreed to sell its digital imaging patents for about $ 525 million, a key step to bringing the photography pioneer out of bankruptcy in the first half of 2013.

The deal for the 1,100 patents allows Kodak to fulfill a condition for securing $ 830 million in financing.

The patent deal was reached with a consortium led by Intellectual Ventures and RPX Corp, and which includes some of the world’s biggest technology companies, which will license or acquire the patents.

Those companies are Adobe Systems Inc, Amazon.com Inc, Apple Inc, Facebook Inc, Fujifilm, Google Inc, Huawei Technologies Co Ltd, HTC Corp, Microsoft Corp, Research In Motion Ltd, Samsung Electronics Co Ltd and Shutterfly Inc, according to court documents.

Kodak still must sell its personalized and document-imaging businesses as part of the financing package, and also has to resolve its UK pension obligation.

Kodak said the patent deal puts it on a path to emerge from Chapter 11 in the first half of 2013.

“Our progress has accelerated over the past several weeks as we prepare to emerge as a strong, sustainable company,” said Antonio Perez, chairman and chief executive of the Rochester, New York-based company.

The patent portfolio was expected to be a major asset for Kodak when it filed for bankruptcy in January. An outside firm had estimated the patents could be worth as much as $ 2.6 billion.

Kodak’s patents hit the market as intellectual property values have soared and technology companies have plowed money into patent-related litigation.

For example, last year Nortel Networks sold 6,000 wireless patents in a bankruptcy auction for $ 4.5 billion and earlier this year Google spent $ 12.5 billion for patent-rich Motorola Mobility.

But Kodak’s patent auction dragged on beyond the initial expectation that it would be wrapped up in August. One patent specialist blamed those early, overly optimistic valuations, which he said encouraged Kodak’s team to set their sights too high.

“Unfortunately (Kodak management) was misled into thinking it was worth billions of dollars and it wasn’t,” said Alex Poltorak, chairman of General Patent Corp, a patent licensing firm. “I think they sold them at a very good price.”

He said after Google acquired Motorola, the search engine company no longer needed patents at any price, deflating the intellectual property market.

Kodak traces its roots to the 19th century and invented the handheld camera. But it has been unable to successfully shift to digital imaging.

It will likely be a different company when it exits bankruptcy, out of the consumer business and focused instead on providing products and services to the commercial imaging market.

The patent sale is subject to approval by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan.

The Kodak bankruptcy case is in Re: Eastman Kodak Co. et al, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Southern District of New York, No. 12-10202.

(Reporting by Tom Hals in Wilmington, Delaware and Sruthi Ramakrishnan in Bangalore; Editing by Nick Zieminski,; John Wallace and Peter Galloway)

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The X Factor: Finalists Sing for Votes One Last Time

TV Watch

The X Factor

By Aaron Parsley

12/19/2012 at 10:40 PM EST

from left: Fifth Harmony, Tate Stevens and Carly Rose Sonenclar

Ray Mickshaw/FOX

Who's going to get a $5 million recording contract?

The X Factor's season 2 finale got underway Wednesday night with the finalists performing three songs each – including a duet with a music superstar.

Britney Spears's contestant, Carly Rose Sonenclar, has been a favorite, trading the No. 1 spot with her fellow finalist, L.A. Reid's country singer Tate Stevens, through out the competition.

Carly first reprised "Feeling Good," and sang it better than the first time she performed it during her audition, according to judge Simon Cowell. "It's shocking how bright your star is," Spears said. She performed her duet with Leann Rimes, singing the country star's hit, "How Do I Live." Her final performance – of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" – had the judges gushing. "You looked like an angel," Demi Lovato said. "You sang like a ridiculously talented angel."

Tate, the competition's only country singer, first performed "Anything Goes" by Randy Houser. "I'm still obsessed with you," Demi said. Added Simon, "You are made in America. You are authentic." For his duet, he sang Little Big Town's cheeky party anthem, "Pontoon." And for his final performance in the competition, Tate sang Chris Young's "Tomorrow." "In a year's time," Simon said, "We're going to be hearing about your record sales."

"I'm almost crying because I realize it's the last time I'm going to see you perform on that stage," Demi said.

Simon's remaining act, girl group Fifth Harmony, may have had their best night yet in the competition, beginning with "Anything Can Happen." L.A. called it "magical," adding that they're "the one to beat." Britney said the colorful performance was "spectacular, girly and fun." Their duet, with The X Factor's own Demi Lovato, of "Give Your Heart a Break" was a highlight of the night.

"These girls are so easy to work with," the judge said. "They're so down to earth, so sweet and I love you guys. This was so much fun."

Their last song, "Let It Be" by the Beatles, proved how much the five members have "blossomed as a group," Britney said. Admitting his bias, their mentor Simon said, based on their performances on Wednesday, the girls of Fifth Harmony "deserve to win the competition."

Do you agree? Or is Tate or Carly your choice for the big prize? Tell us in the comments below.

The winner will be revealed Thursday in a two-hour show that will include a performance by One Direction.

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Experts: Kids are resilient in coping with trauma

WASHINGTON (AP) — They might not want to talk about the gunshots or the screams. But their toys might start getting into imaginary shootouts.

Last week's school shooting in Connecticut raises the question: What will be the psychological fallout for the children who survived?

For people of any age, regaining a sense of security after surviving violence can take a long time. They're at risk for lingering anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder.

But after the grief and fear fades, psychiatrists say most of Newtown's young survivors probably will cope without long-term emotional problems.

"Kids do tend to be highly resilient," said Dr. Matthew Biel, chief of child and adolescent psychiatry at MedStar Georgetown University Hospital.

And one way that younger children try to make sense of trauma is through play. Youngsters may pull out action figures or stuffed animals and re-enact what they witnessed, perhaps multiple times.

"That's the way they gain mastery over a situation that's overwhelming," Biel explained, saying it becomes a concern only if the child is clearly distressed while playing.

Nor is it unusual for children to chase each other playing cops-and-robbers, but now parents might see some also pretending they're dead, added Dr. Melissa Brymer of the UCLA-Duke National Center for Child Traumatic Stress.

Among the challenges will be spotting which children are struggling enough that they may need professional help.

Newtown's tragedy is particularly heart-wrenching because of what such young children grappled with — like the six first-graders who apparently had to run past their teacher's body to escape to safety.

There's little scientific research specifically on PTSD, post-traumatic stress disorder, in children exposed to a burst of violence, and even less to tell if a younger child will have a harder time healing than an older one.

Overall, scientists say studies of natural disasters and wars suggest most children eventually recover from traumatic experiences while a smaller proportion develop long-term disorders such as PTSD. Brymer says in her studies of school shootings, that fraction can range from 10 percent to a quarter of survivors, depending on what they actually experienced. A broader 2007 study found 13 percent of U.S. children exposed to different types of trauma reported some symptoms of PTSD, although less than 1 percent had enough for an official diagnosis.

Violence isn't all that rare in childhood. In many parts of the world — and in inner-city neighborhoods in the U.S., too — children witness it repeatedly. They don't become inured to it, Biel said, and more exposure means a greater chance of lasting psychological harm.

In Newtown, most at risk for longer-term problems are those who saw someone killed, said Dr. Carol North of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, who has researched survivors of mass shootings.

Friday's shootings were mostly in two classrooms of Sandy Hook Elementary School, which has about 450 students through fourth-grade.

But those who weren't as close to the danger may be at extra risk, too, if this wasn't their first trauma or they already had problems such as anxiety disorders that increase their vulnerability, she said.

Right after a traumatic event, it's normal to have nightmares or trouble sleeping, to stick close to loved ones, and to be nervous or moody, Biel said.

To help, parents will have to follow their child's lead. Grilling a child about a traumatic experience isn't good, he stressed. Some children will ask a lot of questions, seeking reassurance, he said. Others will be quiet, thinking about the experience and maybe drawing or writing about it, or acting it out at playtime. Younger children may regress, becoming clingy or having tantrums.

Before second grade, their brains also are at a developmental stage some refer to as magical thinking, when it's difficult to distinguish reality and fantasy. Parents may have to help them understand that a friend who died isn't in pain or lonely but also isn't coming back, Brymer said.

When problem behaviors or signs of distress continue for several weeks, Brymer says it's time for an evaluation by a counselor or pediatrician.

Besides a supportive family, what helps? North advises getting children back into routines, together with their friends, and easing them back into a school setting. Studies of survivors of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks found "the power of the support of the people who went through it with you is huge," she said.

Children as young as first-graders can benefit from cognitive-behavioral therapy, Georgetown's Biel said. They can calm themselves with breathing techniques. They also can learn to identify and label their feelings — anger, frustration, worry — and how to balance, say, a worried thought with a brave one.

Finally, avoid watching TV coverage of the shooting, as children may think it's happening all over again, Biel added. He found that children who watched the 9/11 clips of planes hitting the World Trade Center thought they were seeing dozens of separate attacks.

___

EDITOR'S NOTE — Lauran Neergaard covers health and medical issues for The Associated Press in Washington.

Read More..

Shares, euro rise on hopes of U.S. "cliff" deal, BOJ easing

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Asian shares rose and the euro hit multi-month highs on Wednesday as signs of progress in resolving the U.S. "fiscal cliff" budget crisis and expectations of more aggressive monetary stimulus from the Bank of Japan lifted riskier assets.

The gains in Asia came after Wall Street's S&P 500 <.spx> rose more than 1 percent, completing its best two-day run in a month, on growing confidence a deal can be reached in Washington to avoid a raft of painful spending cuts and tax rises due to take effect from January if there is no budget agreement. <.n/>

"What is important, and what is driving the market higher, is that the two parties are now in constructive discussions over specific tax levels and spending programs, and working towards a common middle ground," said Cameron Peacock, a strategist at IG Markets in Melbourne.

Industrial commodities such as oil and copper consolidated earlier gains, while gold recovered some lost ground but remained not far above its lowest in nearly four months as progress in the U.S. budget talks limited its safe-haven appeal.

JAPAN SHARES KEEP RISING

Tokyo's Nikkei share average <.n225> rose 1.3 percent, topping 10,000 points for the first time since April, as the Bank of Japan (BOJ) was starting a two-day policy meeting. <.t/>

The BOJ will ease monetary policy and consider adopting a 2 percent inflation target in January, double its current price goal, sources say, after pressure from the incoming prime minister, Shinzo Abe, for stronger efforts to beat deflation.

"The market is already in overbought territory, but investors are increasingly being alarmed that there is a risk of not having Japanese stocks in their portfolios," said Hiroichi Nishi, general manager at SMBC Nikko Securities.

Australian shares <.axjo> rose to a 17-month high, led by miners and banks. MSCI's broadest index of Asia Pacific shares outside Japan <.miapj0000pus> gained 0.3 percent, while S&P 500 futures were flat.

The euro rose as far as $1.3250 on electronic trading platform EBS, its highest since the beginning of May, and against the yen it fetched 111.58, having risen as far as 111.69, its highest since late August 2011.

"Unless U.S. fiscal cliff talks take an unexpected turn for the worse, we believe that EUR/USD will meet our 1.3300 year-end target," analysts at BNP Paribas wrote in a note.

Oil held steady, with Brent crude rising a few cents to around $108.88 a barrel and U.S. crude barely changed just below $88.

"There is more upside potential for Brent because of a revival in the overall economic outlook," said Yusuke Seta, a commodities sales manager at Newedge Japan.

Copper was also flat just above $8,020 a metric ton (1.1023 tons). Copper rallied almost 8 percent from mid-November to hit a two-month high a week ago, but has since lost some ground.

Gold rose 0.3 percent to around $1,675 an ounce, after falling to $1,661.01 on Tuesday, its lowest since August.

(Additional reporting by Ayai Tomisawa in Tokyo and Ian Chua in Sydney; Editing by Richard Borsuk)

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Iraq’s President, Jalal Talabani, Hospitalized After Stroke

BAGHDAD — Jalal Talabani, the president of Iraq, whose influence in mediating disputes among the country’s many political factions has far outweighed the limited powers of the office he occupies, suffered a stroke and was in grave health on Tuesday in a Baghdad hospital.

Scott Nelson/WpN for The New York Times

President Jilal Talabani of Iraq, pictured in May 2006, has been receiving medical treatment abroad in recent years.

Mr. Talabani’s illness cast a shadow over the Kurdish lands in the north where he once fought a guerrilla war and where he now lives, and added a new element of uncertainty to the country’s divided politics a year after the departure of the American military left Iraq’s leaders to steer the country’s shaky democracy on their own.

Officials and doctors said Mr. Talabani, 79, who has been treated abroad for medical conditions in recent years, was in stable condition, but privately other officials suggested his condition was more serious. A hospital official, as well as a high-level government official — both of whom requested anonymity out of respect for Mr. Talabani’s family — said the president was in a coma.

The deteriorating health of Mr. Talabani, a Kurd, comes at a time of heightened political tensions between Iraq’s central government and the semiautonomous Kurdish region. A dispute over land and oil that has festered for years has turned more serious in recent weeks as government forces have sought to take more control of security in disputed territories near Kirkuk, a northern city claimed by both the Kurds and the central government.

Mr. Talabani exerts sway over Iraq’s national affairs beyond the limited powers of his office, which is largely ceremonial. He is seen as a unifying figure with the power, at times, to bring Iraq’s many factions to the bargaining table, among the few national leaders, and perhaps the only one, with that status. His absence from politics would have a profound influence in Baghdad, where Mr. Talabani has been trying to mediate a continuing political crisis that at its core is a contest for power among the country’s three main groups: Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds.

At a brief news conference on Tuesday at the hospital where the president was being treated, a doctor described Mr. Talabani’s condition as “stable” and said he expected it to improve. On Twitter, Mr. Talabani’s son, Qubad Talabani, who represents the Kurdistan Regional Government in Washington, wrote that his father “is currently stable” and “we hope can begin his recovery soon.”

On Monday, Mr. Talabani met with Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki to discuss Iraq’s political problems. Afterward, a statement from Mr. Talabani’s office said, the two men stressed the need for calm and transparent dialogue, as well as “working according to the spirit of the Constitution and the national agreements” as the way to solve the country’s ills.

Mr. Maliki has visited Mr. Talabani in the hospital, according to officials.

Mr. Talabani was apparently rushed to the hospital on Monday evening, although no announcement was made until Tuesday morning.

He is being treated by specialists at a hospital known as the Baghdad Medical City. Officials said doctors were trying to determine whether Mr. Talabani could be flown abroad for care. If not, foreign medical specialists were expected to fly to Baghdad to join the team treating him.

Christine Hauser contributed reporting from New York.

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Nielsen to buy Arbitron for about $1.26B

NEW YORK (AP) — Nielsen, the dominant source of TV ratings, on Tuesday said it had agreed to buy Arbitron for about $ 1.26 billion to expand into radio measurement.

Arbitron pays 70,000 people to carry around gadgets that register what stations they’re listening to. Since Nielsen also collects cash register data, CEO David Calhoun said buying Arbitron will let Nielsen be a one-stop shop for advertisers who want to know how the radio advertising they buy affects product sales.

The acquisition will let Nielsen expand the amount of media consumption it tracks by about 2 hours per person per day to 7 hours, Calhoun said in an interview.

“You don’t find many mediums that allow for that kind of increase,” Calhoun said.

Arbitron’s operations are mainly in the U.S., while Nielsen operates globally. Calhoun said another major driver for the deal is that Nielsen wants to spread Arbitron’s tracking technology to other countries.

Evercore Partners analyst Douglas Arthur said Nielsen doesn’t need traditional radio measurement to grow, but Arbitron seemed like a willing seller, and it will be a “nice complementary but not ‘must have’ platform.”

Nielsen Holdings N.V. said it will pay $ 48 per share, which is a 26 percent premium to Arbitron’s Monday closing price of $ 38.04. Shares of Arbitron, which is based in Columbia, Md., jumped $ 8.99, or 23.6 percent, to close at $ 47.03.

Nielsen, which went public in January 2011, has headquarters in the Netherlands and New York. Its stock added $ 1.30, or 4.4 percent, to close at $ 30.92.

Nielsen said it expects the deal to add about 13 cents per share to its adjusted earnings a year after closing and about 19 cents per share to adjusted earnings two years after closing.

Abitron’s chief operating officer, Sean Creamer, is set to take over as CEO from William Kerr on Jan. 1. Calhoun said he hoped Creamer would remain with Nielsen after the deal closes.

Nielsen said it has a financing commitment for the transaction.

Nielsen was the prime source of audience ratings in the early days of radio, thanks to a device similar to Arbitron’s People Meter. The Audimeter was attached to the radio set. The company’s focus shifted to TV measurement in the 1950s.

On Monday, Nielsen announced a deal with Twitter to measure how much U.S. TV watchers tweet about the shows they’re watching. The “Nielsen Twitter TV Rating” will debut in the fall.

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Kristen Stewart Apologizes for Making Everyone 'So Angry'

12/18/2012 at 06:30 PM EST

Kristen Stewart

Lorenzo Bevilaqua/Disney/Getty

Kristen Stewart is once again saying she's sorry.

A few months after publicly expressing regret over cheating on boyfriend Robert Pattinson with her Snow White and the Huntsman director Rupert Sanders, the actress has some words for everybody else.

"I apologize to everyone for making them so angry," the typically press-shy On the Road star, 22, tells Newsweek. "It was not my intention."

Stewart, who has been the subject of both vitriolic criticism and tremendous support from fans, adds, "It's not a terrible thing if you're either loved or hated."

But at the end of the day, the former Twilight star is primarily focused on her craft.

"I don't care [about people's opinions]," she explains. "It doesn't keep me from doing my s–––."

Addressing her most famous role, that of Bella Swan in the Twilight franchise, she says, "The only relief when it comes to Twilight is that the story is done ... I start every project to finish the mother––, and to extend that [mentality] over a five-year period adapting all of these treasured moments over four books, it was constantly worrying."

As for always being know to a generation of moviegoers as Bella, she says, "As long as people's perspective of me doesn't keep me from doing what I want to do, it doesn’t matter.”

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Experts: Kids are resilient in coping with trauma

WASHINGTON (AP) — They might not want to talk about the gunshots or the screams. But their toys might start getting into imaginary shootouts.

Last week's school shooting in Connecticut raises the question: What will be the psychological fallout for the children who survived?

For people of any age, regaining a sense of security after surviving violence can take a long time. They're at risk for lingering anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder.

But after the grief and fear fades, psychiatrists say most of Newtown's young survivors probably will cope without long-term emotional problems.

"Kids do tend to be highly resilient," said Dr. Matthew Biel, chief of child and adolescent psychiatry at MedStar Georgetown University Hospital.

And one way that younger children try to make sense of trauma is through play. Youngsters may pull out action figures or stuffed animals and re-enact what they witnessed, perhaps multiple times.

"That's the way they gain mastery over a situation that's overwhelming," Biel explained, saying it becomes a concern only if the child is clearly distressed while playing.

Nor is it unusual for children to chase each other playing cops-and-robbers, but now parents might see some also pretending they're dead, added Dr. Melissa Brymer of the UCLA-Duke National Center for Child Traumatic Stress.

Among the challenges will be spotting which children are struggling enough that they may need professional help.

Newtown's tragedy is particularly heart-wrenching because of what such young children grappled with — like the six first-graders who apparently had to run past their teacher's body to escape to safety.

There's little scientific research specifically on PTSD, post-traumatic stress disorder, in children exposed to a burst of violence, and even less to tell if a younger child will have a harder time healing than an older one.

Overall, scientists say studies of natural disasters and wars suggest most children eventually recover from traumatic experiences while a smaller proportion develop long-term disorders such as PTSD. Brymer says in her studies of school shootings, that fraction can range from 10 percent to a quarter of survivors, depending on what they actually experienced. A broader 2007 study found 13 percent of U.S. children exposed to different types of trauma reported some symptoms of PTSD, although less than 1 percent had enough for an official diagnosis.

Violence isn't all that rare in childhood. In many parts of the world — and in inner-city neighborhoods in the U.S., too — children witness it repeatedly. They don't become inured to it, Biel said, and more exposure means a greater chance of lasting psychological harm.

In Newtown, most at risk for longer-term problems are those who saw someone killed, said Dr. Carol North of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, who has researched survivors of mass shootings.

Friday's shootings were mostly in two classrooms of Sandy Hook Elementary School, which has about 450 students through fourth-grade.

But those who weren't as close to the danger may be at extra risk, too, if this wasn't their first trauma or they already had problems such as anxiety disorders that increase their vulnerability, she said.

Right after a traumatic event, it's normal to have nightmares or trouble sleeping, to stick close to loved ones, and to be nervous or moody, Biel said.

To help, parents will have to follow their child's lead. Grilling a child about a traumatic experience isn't good, he stressed. Some children will ask a lot of questions, seeking reassurance, he said. Others will be quiet, thinking about the experience and maybe drawing or writing about it, or acting it out at playtime. Younger children may regress, becoming clingy or having tantrums.

Before second grade, their brains also are at a developmental stage some refer to as magical thinking, when it's difficult to distinguish reality and fantasy. Parents may have to help them understand that a friend who died isn't in pain or lonely but also isn't coming back, Brymer said.

When problem behaviors or signs of distress continue for several weeks, Brymer says it's time for an evaluation by a counselor or pediatrician.

Besides a supportive family, what helps? North advises getting children back into routines, together with their friends, and easing them back into a school setting. Studies of survivors of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks found "the power of the support of the people who went through it with you is huge," she said.

Children as young as first-graders can benefit from cognitive-behavioral therapy, Georgetown's Biel said. They can calm themselves with breathing techniques. They also can learn to identify and label their feelings — anger, frustration, worry — and how to balance, say, a worried thought with a brave one.

Finally, avoid watching TV coverage of the shooting, as children may think it's happening all over again, Biel added. He found that children who watched the 9/11 clips of planes hitting the World Trade Center thought they were seeing dozens of separate attacks.

___

EDITOR'S NOTE — Lauran Neergaard covers health and medical issues for The Associated Press in Washington.

Read More..

Hopes rise for "fiscal cliff" deal as Obama, Boehner meet

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The differences over how to resolve the "fiscal cliff" narrowed significantly Monday night as President Barack Obama made a counter-offer to Republicans that included a major change in position on tax hikes for the wealthy, according to a source familiar with the talks.

The move, which the source stressed was not Obama's final offer, was welcomed, albeit with reservations, by a spokesman for Republican House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner, who met earlier in the day with Obama as the two hammered out a way to avert steep tax hikes and indiscriminate spending reductions set for the beginning of 2013.

In its most dramatic change in position yet, the White House proposed leaving lower tax rates in place for everyone except those earning $400,000 and above, the source said on condition of anonymity. That's up from the $250,000 threshold the president has been demanding for months, but still far from Boehner's preference of $1 million.

Obama also moved closer to Boehner on the proportion of a ten-year deficit reduction package that should come from increased revenue, as opposed to cuts in government spending. Obama is now willing to accept a revenue figure of $1.2 trillion, down from his previous $1.4 trillion proposal.

Boehner's latest proposal calls for $1 trillion in new tax revenue, which would come from raising rates and limiting deductions that the wealthiest can take.

Some of the savings in spending proposed by Obama would come from reducing the size of cost-of-living increases for all but the most "vulnerable" recipients of the Social Security retirement program, the source said, through the use of a different formula to calculate the regular raises called "chained Consumer Price Index."

In the most hopeful sign, the source stressed that this was by no means the final offer from the White House.

The response from Boehner's spokesman was also a positive signal. "Any movement away from the unrealistic offers the president has made previously is a step in the right direction," the spokesman said, emphasizing that differences remain on spending levels in particular.

"We hope to continue discussions with the president so we can reach an agreement that is truly balanced and begins to solve our spending problem."

The rapid developments Monday evening put a deal realistically within reach.

The two men held talks at the White House earlier Monday and aides from both parties said they were optimistic an agreement was shaping up.

Though Obama and Boehner appeared to be edging closer to an agreement, substantial hurdles remain. Rank-and-file Republicans could have trouble with the tax increases on the wealthiest Americans that are likely to be part of any deal, while Obama could have a tough time selling spending cuts to his fellow Democrats.

But investors were cheered earlier Monday, before news broke of Obama's counter-offer, by signs of progress and the Standard & Poor's 500 index of U.S. stocks rose 1.19 percent.

Economists warn that going over the fiscal cliff could push the economy into recession.

Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid said his chamber will wrap up work on the issue after Christmas.

"It appears that we're going to be coming back the day after Christmas to complete work on the fiscal cliff," he said on the Senate floor.

Boehner faces a crucial test on Tuesday morning when he is expected to brief his party's lawmakers in the Republican-controlled House. He is not expected to bring any deal up for a vote unless a majority of the 241 House Republicans support it.

Republicans have campaigned for decades on a promise to keep taxes low, but Boehner in recent days has edged closer to Obama's demand to raise tax rates on top earners. In return, Obama could back a measure that would slow the rate of growth of Social Security benefits by changing the way they are measured against inflation, according to a Senate Democratic aide.

GETTING CLOSER ON TAXES

If there are no strong objections, he could try to finalize the deal with Obama on Wednesday, a Republican aide said.

Both sides declined to say what Boehner and Obama discussed at the meeting, which was also attended by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.

The White House said Boehner's latest proposal does not meet its standards.

"Thus far, the president's proposal is the only proposal that we have seen that achieves the balance that is so necessary," White House spokesman Jay Carney said at a news briefing.

Republicans understand that the clock is ticking and they are confident that Boehner will get a deal they can support in the coming days, a senior House Republican aide said.

Republicans want substantial spending cuts in return for increased tax revenue, but any proposal to trim popular benefit programs like the Medicare health insurance plan for seniors will face fierce resistance from liberal Democrats, whose votes will be needed to get a deal passed.

Obama could also face strong opposition from Democrats if he agrees to Boehner's proposal to slow the growth of Social Security benefits by changing the way the cost-of-living increases are measured against inflation, an approach that could save $200 billion over 10 years.

Obama also wants to head off another confrontation over the U.S. debt limit, which will need to be raised in the coming months. Republicans insist that any increase in the government's $16.4 trillion borrowing authority must be paired with an equal reduction in spending.

(Additional reporting by Thomas Ferraro, Mark Felsenthal, Rachelle Younglai and Jeff Mason; Writing by Andy Sullivan; Editing by Alistair Bell, Eric Beech and Paul Simao)

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Bangladesh Finds Gross Negligence in Factory Fire

DHAKA, Bangladesh — Criminal charges for “unpardonable negligence” should be brought against the owner of the Bangladesh garment factory where a fire killed 112 people last month, according to a preliminary report from a government inquiry submitted Monday.

“The owner of the factory cannot be indemnified from the death of large numbers of workers from this fire,” Main Uddin Khandaker, the official who led the inquiry, said in an interview. “Unpardonable negligence of the owner is responsible for the death of workers.”

The Nov. 24 fire at the Tazreen Fashions factory, where workers were making clothes for global retailers like Walmart and Sears, has focused attention on the unsafe work conditions and low wages at many garment factories in Bangladesh, the No. 2 exporter of apparel after China. The fire also has exposed flaws in the system that monitors the industry’s global supply chain: Walmart and Sears say they had no idea their apparel was being made there.

Mr. Khandaker submitted a 214-page report to Bangladesh’s Home Ministry on Monday, saying that the factory owner, Delowar Hossain, and nine of his midlevel managers and supervisors prevented employees from leaving their sewing machines even after a fire alarm sounded.

Mr. Hossain could not be reached for comment.

The report also stated that the fire was “an act of sabotage,” but it did not provide any evidence.

Some labor advocates found that explanation unconvincing. “They don’t say who did it, they don’t say where in the factory it was done, they don’t say how they learned it,” said Scott Nova, executive director of the Worker Rights Consortium, a monitoring group in Washington. “Regardless of what sparked the fire, it is clear that the unsafe nature of this factory and the actions taken by management once the fire started were the primary contributors to the horrendous death toll.”

Bangladeshi officials have been under intense domestic and international pressure to investigate the blaze and charge those deemed responsible. Families of the victims have demanded legal action against Mr. Hossain. Labor advocates have argued that the global brands using the factory also shared in the responsibility for the tragedy.

Fires have been a persistent problem in Bangladesh’s garment industry for more than a decade, with hundreds of workers killed over the years. Mr. Khandaker said his inquiry recommended the creation of a government task force to oversee regular inspections of factories and uphold the rights of workers.

Bangladesh has more than 4,500 garment factories, which employ more than four million workers, many of them young women. The industry is crucial to the national economy as a source of employment and foreign currency. Garments constitute about four-fifths of the country’s manufacturing exports, and the industry is expected to grow rapidly.

But Bangladesh’s manufacturing formula depends on keeping wages low and restricting the rights of workers. The minimum wage in the garment industry is $37 a month, unions are almost nonexistent, and garment workers have taken to the streets in recent years in sometimes violent protests over wages and work conditions.

Workers at Tazreen Fashions had staged small demonstrations in the months before the fire, demanding wages they were owed. On the night of the fire, more than 1,150 people were inside the eight-story building, working overtime shifts to fill orders for various international brands. Fire officials say the fire broke out in the open-air ground floor, where large mounds of fabric and yarn were illegally stored; Bangladeshi law requires that such flammable materials be stored in a room with fireproof walls.

The blaze quickly spread across the length of the ground floor — roughly the size of a football field — as fire and toxic smoke filtered up through the building’s three staircases. The factory lacked a sprinkler system or an outdoor fire escape; employees were supposed to use interior staircases, and many escaped that way.

But on some floors, managers ordered workers to ignore a fire alarm and stay to work. Precious minutes were lost. Then, as smoke and fire spread throughout the building, many workers were trapped, unable to descend the smoke-filled staircases and blocked from escape by iron grilles on many windows. Desperate workers managed to break open some windows and leap to the roof of a nearby building and safety. Others simply jumped from upper floors to the ground.

“We have also found unpardonable negligence of midlevel officials at the factory,” Mr. Khandaker said. “They prevented workers from coming down. We recommend taking proper legal measures against them.”

Mr. Khandaker listed a host of violations at Tazreen Fashions: managers on some floors closed collapsible gates to block workers from running down the staircases, the ground-floor warehouse was illegal and the building’s escape plan improper, and the factory lacked a required closed-circuit television monitoring system. None of the fire extinguishers in the factory appeared to have been used on the night of the fire, suggesting poor preparedness and training.

Moreover, Mr. Khandaker said, the factory lacked a required fire safety certificate. It had applied for an annual renewal, but a certificate had not yet been issued.

Asked about the allegation of sabotage, Mr. Khandaker said that investigators had found no evidence of an electrical short circuit, and that eyewitnesses had suggested possible foul play. He said the report recommended a full criminal investigation into the matter.

“It seems to us that it was sabotage,” he said. “Somebody set the fire.”

Julfikar Ali Manik reported from Dhaka, and Jim Yardley from New Delhi. Steven Greenhouse contributed reporting from New York.

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