Finance & Capital Management

Bi-Lo Holdings and Delhaize Group have received approval from the Federal Trade Commission to proceed with the transaction in which Bi-Lo Holdings will acquire substantially all of the stores in the Sweetbay, Harveys and Reid’s supermarket chains from Delhaize.

New York -- Bi-Lo Holdings and Delhaize Group have received approval from the Federal Trade Commission to proceed with the transaction in which Bi-Lo Holdings will acquire substantially all of the stores in Delhaize’s Sweetbay, Harveys and Reid’s supermarket chains. As part of the deal, Bi-Lo agreed to divest 12 Delhaize America stores in Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina, and Delhaize Group agreed to retain two stores that were initially part of the deal.

Despite an 11% profit increase in the fourth quarter, sales at Macy’s missed forecasts as ongoing winter storms hurt the retailer’s results in January.

Macy’s reported net income of $811 million during the fourth quarter, up 5% from $730 million in the same period a year earlier. Sales dropped 1.6% to $9.2 billion from $9.35 billion. Analysts had expected a more modest decline to about $9.28 billion. Same-store sales grew 1.4% for the quarter, less than the 2.5% projected by Wall Street.

Tokyo – Major Bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox has reportedly gone offline with no advance notice or explanation. According to NBC News, the Mt. Gox website is blank, its offices are closed, its Twitter account has deleted all tweets, and all trading has been halted.

Stein Mart plans to open 10 new stores this year as part of its largest store expansion since 2007.

Locations in the Miami, Washington, D.C., and Las Vegas areas are set to open this spring, bringing the company's total nationwide store count to more than 270.

Austin, Texas — CBRE has announced three more Austin-area locations for local fast casual restaurant VERTS, bringing its store count to 10. In 2014, VERTS plans to open 13 new locations, including expansions into Dallas and Houston.

The newest locations are in North Austin. Locations in Round Rock and Cedar Park will open in the next two months.

Since Office Depot completed its merger transaction with OfficeMax Nov. 5, 2013, the company has been aggressively executing its integration plan. The company’s fourth quarter results for the period ended Dec. 28, 2013 include OfficeMax’s operations, which generated $939 million of sales.

Arcadia, Wis. -- Ashley Furniture HomeStore, the largest furniture retailer in the U.S., celebrated the opening of its 500th store in Longview, Texas, on Feb. 21. It is the chain’s 48th store in the Lone Star state.

The company, whose sales exceeded $3 billion in 2013, has 50 additional HomeStore openings on tap in 2014.