Aluminum smelter Alcoa has announced that it will be firing 660 at its Rockdale plant. Company flack Kevin Lower blamed the problem on Luminant, Alcoa’s power company:

“When you’re running an aluminum smelter, power needs to be online for 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, for 50 years… But it would be offline, then online, then offline, then online. It was like a yo-yo.”

Luminant accepted a small amount of responsibility, but also blasted Alcoa’s claim to pieces in this prepared statement:

“We had some outages, but we made several alternative arrangements to get them reasonably priced power, and they didn’t take advantage of that… We believe Alcoa has a history of using layoffs like this as a vehicle for managing costs and driving the company’s profitability. Alcoa should acknowledge its independent decisions instead of blaming power supply issues and unspecified ‘market conditions”

Find out more: Houston Chronicle

Apparently a 25% increase in base-pay and a $2 million dollar bonus. Big round of applause for Neil Smit! Interested investors should visit Charter’s website.

Get the details here.

In this email sent to Pfizer’s research and development staff, head of research Martin Mackay discloses that the company will be cutting development of high cholesterol and artery disease drugs. He outlines in detail the company’s R&D pipeline. Read the full memo here.
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One of the world’s best drug-pushers, GlaxoSmithKline, has announced that it will be cutting 850 research and development positions “in a bid to improve productivity.” The layoffs the company had in June must have improved efficiency so much, that they felt the need to go through another round.

More info: Reuters

Arnprior Aerospace has just laid off 120 factory workers and more could be on the way. Brent Pierce, the company’s human resources flack, has said that the firings were a direct result of the Boeing strike that has been ongoing.

More bad news could be on the way for Arnprior workers left behind — it’s never good to hear this from the company HR director:

“There definitely could be more layoffs.”

So this is what it looks like when the Dow loses 7% and the Nasdaq loses 9%:

Blood on the street

Further coverage:

• Wall St. Journal: Stocks Plunge as Rescue Plan Fails to Gain House Approval
• New York Times: House Rejects Bailout Package, 228-205; Stocks Plunge
• Bloomberg: U.S. Stocks Plunge After House Votes Against Bailout Plan
• CNBC: Dow Closes Down Nearly 800 as Market Reels

Bill Heard Chevrolet has filed for bankruptcy with outstanding debts between $500 million and $1 billion. Before closing all dealerships, the company had a burn rate of nearly $5 million every month.

Scrambling Wachovia has finally found a sap willing to buy them in Citigroup. Citigroup has agreed to swallow the $42 billion in losses from Wachovia’s loan portfolio; the FDIC has agreed to cover any further losses. The FDIC insisted, however, that Wachovia had not failed. Great job, guys!

Further coverage:

• Yahoo Finance: Citigroup to buy Wachovia banking operations
• The Guardian: Wachovia agrees to Citigroup takeover
• The Wall St. Journal: Citigroup to Acquire Wachovia Assets

FedEx has announced that it will be axing 200 employees in its FedEx Office division. The company will also be closing 20 stores nationwide as part of a “companywide realignment.”

More info: Dallas Business Journal

A major stakeholder in AIG, Starr International, has just sold a massive 35 million shares in the federally-managed insurer. The total value of the shares is $107 million, but if Starr had sold out at the beginning of the year the take would have been over $2 billion. That smarts.

Finviz has the paper trail.

Europe’s largest bank, HSBC, is laying off 4% of its global banking division — 1,100 workers. Company flack Gareth Hewett had this to say:

“We’ve taken the action because of the current market conditions, the economic environment and our cautious outlook of 2009.”

The company was profitable for the first half of the year by $7.7 billion.

Fine print: Yahoo Finance

Our favorite poulty-producer, Pilgrim’s Pride, is really busting a move to the wall of shame. Besides the layoffs and the stock implosion, the company’s bonds have now achieved junk status. A Morningstar analyst has also said that bankruptcy is a “very real possibility.” Ouch.

Chrysler will be firing 250 salaried jobs possibly as soon as tomorrow. The company has had trouble lately: it announced layoffs of 1,000 employees last July, and has reportedly dropped 25% in sales. This is part of the company’s depressing “goal” of 22,000 employee firings for this year. I wish I were joking.

Details at Reuters

In a move that has been in the works for months, the feds have seized WaMu and announced a deal to sell their deposits and branches to competitor JP Morgan. According to the Wall Street Journal, this is the largest bank failure in U.S. history. Details of the transaction between WaMu and JP Morgan aren’t yet known, but the FDIC will not be tapped for any payments to customers.

Further coverage:

• The Wall St. Journal: J.P. Morgan to Take Over Faltering WaMu
• Bloomberg: JPMorgan Chase May Acquire Washington Mutual After FDIC Seizure
• The New York Times: Government Seizes WaMu and Sells Some Assets
• Forbes: WaMu’s Shotgun Wedding

It was a bad day to be a shareholder in slot-machine empire Progressive Gaming. The company announced that it would miss its 2008 revenue numbers — sending the stock down 40% to its lowest price ever. The company also announced the immediate departure of its CEO, Russel McMeekin. Take a look at the most crowded press release I’ve ever seen.