Tobacco News

Smokers might be in line for a big payday as a jury deliberates a decade-long lawsuit over the perceived safety of light cigarettes.

The case pits smokers against tobacco giant Philip Morris. Damages could amount to $700 million, and anyone in Missouri who smoked Marlboro Light cigarettes will be eligible for thousands of dollars.

It’s taken 11 years for the case to get a jury. They’re deciding if Philip Morris should pay up for deceiving smokers. Ream more »

The minister was speaking shortly after visiting the Maputo offices of British American Tobacco (BAT).

Inroga stressed the importance of the tobacco industry to Mozambique’s economy, despite the dangers to health caused by smoking.

He pointed out that the tobacco crop is the main livelihood for a large number of families in the provinces of Nampula, Niassa, Tete and Zambezia.
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The Tobacco Board, which oversees cultivation, trade and marketing of tobacco in the country, is now exploring options of tobacco exports to China.

A team led by chairman G Kamalavardhan Rao and others had recently visited China to study the market conditions and also to interact with State Trade Monopoly Administration (STMA), the policymaking body of tobacco industry in China. Ream more »

The Wisconsin Department of Revenue has put roll-your-own cigarette businesses – including one in Mauston – on notice that they are manufacturers and distributors and must pay appropriate excise taxes.
Paying those taxes, and meeting a requirement that they sell at least half the cigarettes they produce to other vendors, would obliterate the business model of RYO stores operating in Mauston, Reedsburg, Portage, Baraboo and Wisconsin Dells.
RYO stores – the department estimates there are 50 to 100 in Wisconsin – operate on the rationale that they are not selling manufactured cigarettes, but rather are selling components such as tobacco and tubes and then renting time on jukebox-sized machines that put all the pieces together to create “smokes.” Ream more »

The Cass County Board held a second reading and approved amendments to the county tobacco ordinance Tuesday. The revised ordinance takes effect Nov. 15.

The board also set a fee schedule for violations of the ordinance, which for the first time will hold employees selling tobacco products to underage people liable as well as the license holder.

Clerks and employees will now be charged $50 per violation if they sell to minors.
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A startling revelation seems to have hit the smoking front. Recently, the UCLA analysts have disclosed that companies were apparently aware that cigarette smoke comprised radioactive alpha particles for almost more than 4 decades and its cancerous attributes but chose to keep mum.

An extensive analysis of the documents from the tobacco industry since 1998 showed that the industry knew the presence of radioactive materials in cigarettes 5 years earlier than initially assumed. Also, investigations to gauge its lung cancer risk had begun right from the 1960s.
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Of late, smokers are being exposed to a variety of methods to help quit their habit, one of them being electronic cigarettes. Now, a study conducted by experts from the Cancer Research U.K has disclosed that the nicotine substitute cytisine which is commercially sold as Tabex could raise the chances of a person giving up the habit of smoking by 3 folds for a minimum of 1 year.
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The threatened litigation by the tobacco industry against proposed plain packaging laws is part of a larger strategy of seeking to frustrate the regulation of tobacco advertising and branding, according to a leading intellectual property expert.

Speaking at last night’s Senate Legal and Constitutional Committee, Dr Matthew Rimmer, an Associate Professor from the ANU College of Law, said that the proposed new laws would fulfil the Australian Government’s obligations under the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.
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It has taken a little longer than it did for many of the state’s colleges and universities, but OU’s Norman campus will soon be tobacco free. The Health Science Center in Oklahoma City and Tulsa campuses are already tobacco free.

It follows the policies first advanced on Norman public school campuses years ago. Norman Regional Hospital followed. Oklahoma State University is tobacco free, as is Rose State College. Ream more »

Tobacco stocks have proven, as wells as most consumer staples, to be less immune to difficult economic environments. I am assuming the U.S. economy is still in a recession. In my opinion, tobacco stocks provide the appropriate risk and reward balance for dividend investors. Consumer staples, such as tobacco and food, continue to sell worldwide despite economic difficulties.
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