WASHINGTON >> Interest rates on long-term home loans rose this week to the highest level in months.
Mortgage giant Freddie Mac said Thursday that the rate on 30-year, fixed-rate mortgages rose to 4.04 percent this week, highest since May and up from 3.99 percent last week. The rate on 15-year, fixed-rate mortgages rose to 3.49 percent, the highest since March and up from 3.44 percent last week.
The rate on five-year adjustable-rate mortgages was unchanged this week at 3.46 percent.
Burger King launches quarter-pound burger
NEW YORK >> Burger King is looking to start a beef with McDonald’s.
The chain says the Double Quarter Pound King, its own version of McDonald’s quarter-pound burger, hit restaurants Thursday. An ad shows Burger King’s mascot at a funeral for a competitor’s burger but doesn’t mention McDonald’s by name.
It comes as McDonald’s is working to swap out frozen beef patties for fresh ones in its Quarter Pounder. Burger King says it uses frozen patties.
The chain has thrown fire at rivals before: Last year Burger King sold spicy nuggets after Wendy’s stopped offering a similar snack.
Emirates signs $16B deal with Airbus
The Airbus A380 lives on, for now.
The Dubai-based airline Emirates threw a lifeline Thursday to the A380, the world’s largest passenger aircraft, putting in a $16 billion order for up to 36 of the planes to be delivered starting from 2020. The agreement, which includes a firm commitment to buy 20 aircraft and an option for 16 more, comes just days after Airbus said it would end production of the A380 if it did not receive more orders.
When Airbus started delivering the A380 a decade ago, it pitched the plane as the future of aviation, offering a solution to airport congestion and to increased demand for international travel. The number of planes that can land at an airport on a given day is limited, the European company argued, so the A380, with the capacity to carry more than 500 passengers, would allow airlines to transport more passengers.
But the bet on the four-engine plane turned out to be a financial disaster for Airbus as the industry increasingly used smaller airports, a shift that favored its main competitor, Boeing, and other manufacturers of midsize aircraft.
ON THE MOVE
G70, a leading design firm in Hawaii, has announced the following:
>> Joo-Hyun (Colin) Park has been hired as the firm’s designer. Park was previously working for Byung-Soo Cho Architects, one of the leading architectural firms in South Korea.
>> Alanna Hobbs returns to the firm as a human resource manager. Hobbs has more than 20 years of human resource experience and was previously with G70 from 2005 to 2011.
>> Meldrick Zuniga has been hired as a civil engineer for G70. He will work with the firm’s project team in order to evaluate, prepare, analyze and produce drawings as well as renderings to convey and articulate architectural ideas, engineering and concepts.
Rider Levett Bucknall, a leading construction consultancyfirm, has announced that Erin Kirihara has been promoted to vice president from a principal. Kirihara started with the firm in 2004 and served as an administrative assistant.
