November 29, 1993

The outcome of the battle between QVC Network Inc.'s chairman, Barry Diller, and Viacom Inc.'s chairman, Sumner Redstone, for Paramount Communications is far from predictable, even though QVC won a clear victory in court Wednesday. "It's not a slam dunk," said one exhausted investment banker involved in the deal, assessing the ruling in Delaware Chancery Court requiring Paramount to lift obstacles making it prohibitively expensive for a hostile bidder to gain control of the entertainment company.

With the force and unpredictability of a wind shear, change has swept through the airline industry. Only two years ago, the nation's biggest airlines -- American, United and Delta -- looked to many experts as if they were growing too strong and threatening healthy competition. The list of airlines sending out distress signals included Continental and T.W.A., and Pan Am, Midway and Eastern had been grounded. Today, Continental and T.W.A. have emerged from bankruptcy, the three largest carriers are flashing warnings of bleak futures, and several new airlines have emerged to answer the demands of consumers for low fares.

President Carlos Salinas de Gortari's choice to be the governing party's candidate to succeed him was announced today by the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party. The man chosen to run in the elections, scheduled for Aug. 21, is the Secretary of Social Development, Luis Donaldo Colosio Murrieta, 43, a popular technocrat who has run huge anti-poverty programs and whose views closely mirror those of President Salinas.

The NEC Corporation, which controls half of Japan's personal computer market, is seeing its profits from that business eroded by steep price cuts spurred by the invasion of Japan's market by aggressive American companies. NEC on Friday reported a consolidated net loss of 9.3 billion yen for the six months that ended on Sept. 30. That is equivalent to about $88 million at an exchange rate of 106 yen to the dollar. Net sales for the period, the first half of NEC's fiscal year, fell 2.7 percent to 1.64 trillion yen, or about $15.5 billion.

David Treadwell watches his fellow kicker, Brad Daluiso, kick in practice all the time. He has seen him boot field goals from as far as 60 yards. So when Daluiso lined up with just over a half a minute left today for a 54-yard field goal that would turn a defeat into a victory for the Giants, Treadwell wasn't biting his nails like everyone else in Giants Stadium. He knew the kick would be good. "I was thinking, 'Just smooth it, Brad, just smooth it,' " said Treadwell, who does most of the field-goal kicking on the Giants and is Daluiso's closest friend on the team. "That's what he did. It looked like the ball could have been good from another 15 yards."