Business briefs

LONG ISLAND

New president at Bovie Medical

Melville electrosurgery equipment maker Bovie Medical Corp. has a new president, J. Robert Saron. He replaces Andrew Makrides, who will remain chief executive and chairman of the company board. Saron has been on the company board since 1988. Before his promotion he was chief sales and marketing officer.

-- JOSEPH MALLIA

NATION

Google book deal went 'too far'

A judge rejected a deal between Google and the book industry Tuesday that would have put millions of volumes online, citing antitrust concerns while acknowledging the potential benefit of putting literature in front of the masses. U.S. Circuit Judge Denny Chin in Manhattan said the creation of a universal library would "simply go too far." Still, he left the door open for an eventual deal. The $125-million settlement had drawn hundreds of objections from Google rivals, consumer watchdogs, academic experts, literary agents and even foreign governments. Hilary Ware, Google's managing counsel, called the decision disappointing and said the company was considering its options.

-- AP

Stocks dip amid world turmoil

Stocks edged lower Tuesday, ending a three-day rally that had lifted the Dow Jones industrial average above 12,000 for the first time since the earthquake-tsunami disaster hit Japan more than a week ago. The Dow dipped 17.90 points to close at 12,018.63. The broader Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 4.61, or 0.4 percent, to 1,293.77. The Nasdaq composite index fell 8.22, or 0.3 percent, to 2,683.87. The Dow has moved up or down by at least 100 points in four of the five previous trading days. Developments in Japan's nuclear crisis and the violence in Libya have been driving the volatility. The Dow had jumped 3.6 percent over the previous three days.

-- AP

Worker ID verification plan

The federal government is exploring the possibility of using a credit rating giant like Equifax to verify the identity of American workers, a move that could make it far more difficult for undocumented immigrants to work using stolen Social Security numbers. The plan by the Department of Homeland Security is still preliminary and would probably require congressional approval. The government already allows employers to check the legal status of employees using a system known as E-Verify, but hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants beat the system by using stolen Social Security numbers.

-- The Washington Post

Stimulus earnings lift Fed pay

The Federal Reserve is paying a record $79.3 billion to the U.S. government after the central bank earned a record amount of money last year from programs aimed at boosting the economy. The Fed says its payment to the Treasury Department for 2010 is 67 percent higher than the $47.4 billion it paid in 2009, the previous record. The central bank earned a record $81.7 billion last year from its massive holdings of securities, which were purchased to help stabilize the financial system and pull the economy out of the recession. A portion of those earnings go toward funding the Fed, which receives no appropriations from Congress. Any money left over is turned over to the Treasury Department.

-- AP

BlackBerry iPad rival to debut

Research In Motion Ltd. on Tuesday said its tablet computer, the BlackBerry PlayBook, will start selling in the United States and Canada on April 19 for $499 to $699. RIM said customers can start pre-ordering the gadget -- its answer to Apple Inc.'s popular iPad devices -- through Best Buy.

-- AP