To the Tacoma Community College class that's studying investments:

You've not been forgotten. We're still working on getting the stocks you're tracking in the paper. Until then, here are the Friday closing prices:

ConocoPhillips $43.93 -81 cents or -1.81 percent
OfficeMax Inc. $6.97 -17 cents or -2.38 percent
TriQunit Semiconductor $3.68 -8 cents or -21.3 percent
MassMutual Corporate $21.60 -2 cents or -.09 percent

Seattle-based HomeStreet Bank today joined the list of Washington banks to sign a cease-and-desist order with regulators.

The $3-billion bank has agreed with provisions authored by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and the Washington Department of Financial Institutions.

With the order, the bank must raise capital as well as make certain changes to its internal business practices.

Many of the ingredients of the order have already been addressed, said HomeStreet President and CEO Bruce Williams this afternoon.

“It doesn’t require us to do anything about how we deal with our customers,” he said. “It doesn’t change how we’re doing business. We’ve agreed to a number of things. If you’re already doing something, it’s easy to do them.,”

For example, he said, the bank has been ordered to appoint a chief credit officer – and one is already in place. The bank has been ordered to reduce its construction-loan portfolio, and such a reduction is in force.

“It also requires us to raise our capital levels,” he said. The requirement calls for the bank – within 150 days – to raise its Tier 1 capital to 10 percent and its risk-based capital to 12 percent. As of March 31, according to a statement issued by the bank, HomeStreet had a Tier 1 ratio of 7.6 percent and a risk-based ratio of 7.4 percent.

Asked to provide a figure equal to the requirement, Williams estimated the bank would be required to raise “about $70 million.”

Williams said the bank has already seen improvements in its position, with deposit growth of $500 million since last summer and home-loan originations of “more than a billion.”

“We have some problem loans, and we also have some strengths,” he said.

Williams expressed frustration that no funds are available for community banks to borrow, but said he and his staff would make a “good-faith effort” to secure the funding.

He said he could have extended negotiations with regulators, but preferred to receive the order rather than draw out the process. “We just want to stay focused on our business,” he said.

HomeStreet is privately held, and operates branches or lending centers in Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Hawaii. In the South Sound, the bank operates in Tacoma, Federal Way, Kent, Lakewood and Olympia.

The first question from the audience of some 300 accountants at lunch today recognized the elephant there in the room.

The room was the ballroom at the Greater Tacoma Convention & Trade Center, the accountants were attending the Fifth Annual Financial Reporting Conference sponsored by the Milgard School of Business at University of Washington Tacoma, and the question was addressed to the keynote speaker, Greg Stark, managing director at Russell Investment Group.

Was Russell planning to stay in Tacoma?

The morning, following a welcome by Milgard School Dean Shahrokh Saudagaran, comprised sessions led by Financial Accounting Standards Board member Tom Linsmeier and Security and Exchange Commission Senior Advisor Robert Malhotra. The subjects of the presentations centered on accounting issues currently of interest at the FDIC and SEC.

Stark began his keynote humorously, saying that he loved studying cost accounting – love it so much that he took the course twice in college.

He went on to discuss Russell and the recession, beginning with the reassuring comment: “Things are getting less worse.”

He spoke of good news and not-so-good. The market is volatile, he said, but that volatility has led to a 30 percent increase over the past six weeks. January was the third-worst month the market has seen; February saw the worst; and March was one of the best.

It’s “the roller coaster we are all on.”

The programs around the economic stimulus plan are “starting to work,” he said, although “it’s going to take a while.”

Banks are lending again, he said. Consumers are buying. “The recovery’s not going to be smooth. There are still a few shoes to to drop.”

He said that “we are about one-third to halfway through this recession,” he said, and he predicted that in “the first part of 2010 we’ll see economic growth.”

He named March 9 as the bottom.

Her is sanguine in part, he said, because stocks are outperforming bonds, small-cap stocks are outperforming large-cap, and growth is outperforming value.

Russell as a company has had its challenges lately, he said, but 900 associates remain at 909 A St. in Tacoma and 900 around the world. The company has been – is being – reengineered to become smaller, smarter and more efficient, and, “frankly better.”

He reiterated the Russell mantra of active portfolio management and asset allocation, and proclaimed the well-earned truth: “It takes bad markets to remind us of what matters.”

And will the company remain in the city where it was born?

There will be, Stark said, “a decision by the end of the third quarter.”

A new report from an airline industry group predicts air travel, already battered by the soft economy, will see a seven percent decline in business during the critical summer vacation season.

The Air Transport Association predicts that the number of passengers flying this summer will fall to 14 million. If that prediction holds true, the association predicts further schedule cuts when demand drops in the fall.

A weak summer season could be good news for travelers who are likely to see even further discount fare reductions in a season when fares usually rise.

The House this week approved a war spending bill that includes a $2.2 billion lifeline for Boeing's C-17 transport program.

That program is due to end in 2001 as orders for the four-engine transport end.

The Obama administration has targeted the C-17 program for cuts to trim the Pentagon budget.

The program is the last aircraft construction program in California. The plane is built at a former McDonnell Douglas plant in Long Beach, Calif. Boeing and McDonnell Douglas merged in 1997.

The House version of the spending bill contains money for eight more C-17s. The Senate version contains none.

Intense lobbying from Boeing and other companies that make parts for the C-17 have given the airlifter strong support in Congress. The plane has 650 suppliers in 43 states.

Here we are half way through 2009's fifth month and the net total for Boeing airliners this year is negative one.

That's 49 orders and 50 cancellations. Many weeks this year have been just like the one past: no new orders.

This comes on the heels of three years, 2005, 2006 and 2007, when Boeing orders topped 1,000 aircraft and even hit a record 1,413 in 2007.

That buildup of orders in more prosperous times is one reasons orders are so low this year, when the economy is tanking.

The unprecedented misery in the airline business and the economy as a whole are giving airlines anxiety about spending anything on new equipment.

And the delays in the company's 787 program are giving nervous airlines excuses to cancel long-standing orders for the new plane.

If Boeing's orders don't revive soon, expect the total orders this year to fall way below the low of 249 set in 2003 when the travel industry was still recovering from the 2001 terrorist attacks.

The inaugural Copper River Alaskan salmon have arrived and are trickling into area retailers and restaurants.

Johnny's Seafood Co. rolled its stock of salmon into both its locations on Lakewood Drive and Dock Street a little before 1 p.m., fresh off the Alaska Airlines plane that landed at 7:40 this morning.

Johnny's retail clerk Sheri Jacob said customers – who have been calling for months asking for an estimated time of arrival on the celebrity salmon – can get 'em while their cold from her counter right now. She may need a minute to fillet them though.

Jacob said fish buyers eager to shell out $33 a pound for a fillet of the first sockeye salmon of the season should call ahead to reserve an order. Johnny's is selling whole sockeyes for $24 a pound, King fillets for $42 a pound and whole king salmon for $30 a pound.

The summery weather makes Jacob think these pricey symbols of the season may go faster than usual.

Mike Carver, seafood manager at Metropolitan Market in Proctor, said he thinks his limited supply of the new arrivals will be gone by 3 p.m. Metropolitan is selling fillets of King for $29.99 and fillets of sockeye for $24.99. He said the less than 100 pounds of fish he got today will not be enough to sell whole, but the store will be getting more of the shipment in through the weekend.

If they run out, Carver suggests the Taku River king salmon he's selling for $24.99, which he says is "just as fatty and delicious" as the Copper River breed.

If you're looking for a lower price point, Fred Meyer stores in Gig Harbor and Ballard will begin selling sockeye for $14.99 a pound this afternoon, said spokeswoman Melinda Merrill. She said the price is $4 to $5 less than it was last year.

Top Food & Drug store on 23rd Street in Tacoma will begin selling a limited supply of the salmon this evening or tomorrow morning, said Russ Casteel, seafood buyer for Haggen Food and Pharmacy. Casteel called between flights on his way back from the opening Copper River run.

On your way to the store, Jacob from Johnny's suggests picking up some barbecue sauce to bring the summer out of your salmon, but keep it on the side. Or just enjoy this anticipated first batch au naturale. Either way, retailers say you should hurry if you want a bite of today's booty.