In brief: Hershey to acquire jerky maker

Chocolate-covered jerky? It's no longer a wild idea, with Hershey's on Thursday announcing plans to buy a tiny, trendy jerky company.

Hershey Co., maker of Hershey's Kisses and dozens of other staples of the candy aisle, will buy Krave, a fast-growing business intent on turning jerky, essentially desiccated meat punched up with flavorings, into the next upscale snack food.

Terms were not disclosed. Hershey Co. also announced at the same time that it made public its sales and earnings in the quarter that ended Dec. 31. The company, like other candy companies, has struggled with rising prices for chocolate and dairy products.

Convicted fund managerblames PDVSA

BRIDGEPORT, Conn. - A Venezuelan-American hedge fund manager was sentenced Thursday to 13 years in prison for running a Connecticut fraud scheme involving hundreds of millions of dollars from Venezuela's state oil company, PDVSA.

Francisco Illarramendi expressed remorse and told the judge he committed his crimes only to cover up investment losses under pressure from corrupt Venezuelan government officials.

"This is certainly not Bernie Madoff," the 45-year-old Illarramendi said.

Judge Stefan Underhill noted the defendant took $20 million for himself.

An attorney for the state oil company, Jerome Fortinsky, told the judge his clients are victims and that anybody at the company who took a bribe was a "rogue" employee.

Insider trading charges to be dropped

Five men accused of trading on inside tips about IBM's $1.2 billion purchase of SPSS will have all charges against them dropped after a sweeping appeals court ruling made such cases more difficult to prove.

The charges may be refiled if the "erroneous" appeal ruling is scaled back, though there's no indication that will happen, Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Bauer said Thursday in New York.

U.S. District Judge Andrew Carter said he'll accept the dismissal when he receives the formal request. Bauer said the government doesn't currently have enough evidence to unanimously sway a jury under the new, higher standards.

The men are benefiting from an appeals court decision last month that overturned the insider-trading convictions of two fund managers. The court said that to be found guilty, defendants must know their tips came from someone who not only had a duty to keep them secret but also got a benefit for leaking them.

Those seeking jobless benefits at 15-year low

WASHINGTON - The number of people seeking unemployment aid plunged last week to the lowest level in almost 15 years, a sign hiring will likely remain healthy.

Weekly applications dropped 43,000 to a seasonally adjusted 265,000, the Labor Department said Thursday. The four-week average, a less volatile measure, fell 8,250 to 298,500.

In other news

Fewer Americans signed contracts to buy homes in December, a sign that low mortgage rates have yet to coax more buyers into the market. The National Association of Realtors said its seasonally adjusted pending home sales index fell 3.7 percent.

Mortgage company Freddie Mac said the nationwide average for a 30-year mortgage rose to 3.66 percent from 3.63 percent. The average 15-year loan increased to 2.98 percent from 2.93 percent.

From wire reports