Investments

A unit of the Sony Corporation is thinking about investing in the Kings and helping finance a new arena that owner Bruce McNall would like to build. Sources close to Sony said Thursday that the company had held discussions along those lines. Sony declined to comment. The Kings have acknowledged that they are considering taking on minority partners but have not identified any group by name.

Oracle Corp. confirmed that its venture capital branch made an undisclosed investment in EConnections, a supply-chain management company servicing the electronics industry. El Monte-based EConnections said that Oracle Venture Fund, Oracle's $500-million venture capital unit, has committed an undisclosed investment to the company. Officials with the Oracle Venture Fund were unavailable for comment, but privately owned EConnections meets the fund's basic criteria.

To limit risk and tighten accountability in the aftermath of the county bankruptcy, the City Council today will review a new investment policy. Irvine had $209 million in the county investment pool, which collapsed in late 1994. The policy that led the city to borrow money to invest in the pool resulted in the removal of the city treasurer from office and in an unsuccessful attempt to recall three City Council members. Councilwoman Christina L.

Saudi Arabia's Prince Alwaleed bin Talal plans to invest in Microsoft Corp. Chairman Bill Gates' Teledesic Corp., a statement from the billionaire investor's office said. "Prince Alwaleed plans to invest in a joint project with Teledesic to finance and launch a network of . . . satellites that will transmit voice, data and the Internet to cover every spot on Earth," said the statement from his office in the Saudi capital, Riyadh.

In a deal estimated to be worth $250 million, European media giants Kirch Group and Mediaset have agreed to invest for five years in films from newly formed Spyglass Entertainment. The two companies will receive theatrical, video and television rights to between 15 and 25 films for Germany, Italy, Spain, Poland and the former Soviet Union. Spyglass previously announced a deal with Walt Disney Co., which has domestic distribution rights to its films for the same period.

The Orange County treasurer's office has taken an $11-million write-down on the value of an $80-million investment in a complex fund, a decrease of nearly 14%, according to a county treasury report issued Tuesday. The fund, a structured investment vehicle called Whistlejacket LLC, went into default in February and has been forced into receivership. County treasury officials said the lower pricing on the investment is a conservative estimate of what the securities would currently fetch on the market in a distress sale, but that they expect eventually to recover the full value of their investment, which is scheduled to mature in January.

For many investors, this year has been about not investing. More than $2.2 trillion in cash sits in money market mutual funds. That is approaching the $2.7-trillion value of all stock mutual funds, according to the Investment Company Institute, the funds' chief trade group. More striking has been the buildup of cash in basic bank savings accounts.

Joining banks, insurers and others who are trying to reshape themselves into "financial supermarkets," mortgage lender Countrywide Credit Industries will announce today that it is launching an investment and mutual fund business. The Calabasas-based company said it will initially focus on California, but plans to pitch the new services--including funds, annuities, securities and investment advice--to its 2.7 million customers nationwide.

The Los Angeles Times is inviting readers to submit questions to be asked of the four keynote speakers at the newspaper's Investment Strategies Conference, to be held the weekend of Feb. 7-8 at the Los Angeles Convention Center downtown. By compiling questions for these four speakers in advance rather than soliciting them from the Convention Center floor during the conference, the organizers hope to have a diverse list of questions ready for each keynote speaker.

Investment in Southern California's major development projects, from transportation infrastructure to mega-entertainment complexes, has climbed to $13.6 billion, underscoring strong confidence in the region's economic future, according to a report to be released today. The survey by the Los Angeles Economic Development Corp.