Friday morning headlines

Stocks turn higher: Mostly down week could close on a winning note. Volume still light. Dow is up 70 points.

Gas prices stuck at high end: Average gallon of regular in the L.A. area is $4.119, according to the Auto Club, virtually unchanged from last week and 31 cents higher than last month.

Mixed bag on business spending: Durable goods orders jumped 4.2 percent last month, but the gain was mostly limited to cars and airplanes. Orders for non-defense capital goods, excluding aircraft, fell 3.4 percent, (WSJ)

Use it or lose it budget policies: Rather than save money, state departments will often spend every last dime of their annual budgets. From the Sacramento Bee:

State departments returned less money to the general fund as they faced across-the-board reductions in recent years, according to finance officials. In 2008-09, state departments returned a combined $150 million in a $90.9 billion general fund budget. That total fell to $64 million in 2009-10, followed by $10 million in 2010-11, years in which they faced overhead and employee cuts.

SCAN Health Plan settles: The Long Beach company agreed to pay $320 million in connection with allegations that it was overpaid by the state's Medi-Cal program. SCAN has paid an additional $3.8 million to settle a federal whistle-blower's allegation. (LAT)

Construction stops on Burbank Walmart: A Superior Court Judge issued a preliminary injunction and suspended the city's approval of building permits for a planned supercenter. Judge said that the city had failed to show proper issuance of the permits. (Business Journal)