Leeza Gibbons: I Count My Blessings - Not My Stretch Marks

By Mike Fleeman

02/06/2013 at 07:30 PM EST

When TV personality Leeza Gibbons married Steven Fenton in 2011, she joked that she was finally embracing "my inner cougar" – on their first date he was 38 and she was 51.

Now approaching their two-year anniversary in April, Gibbons has given a little more thought to the dynamics of their relationship and concludes that "the term cougar has so much energy around it that doesn't really fit."

"We laugh about it all the time," Gibbons, now 55, tells PEOPLE. (Fenton is a longtime talent manager and former president of the Board of Education in Beverly Hills.) "I always joke that emotionally and with regard to maturity, he's much older than I am."

The theme of starting over – "rebooting your life," as Gibbons calls it – runs through her new book, Take 2: Your Guide to Creating Happy Endings and New Beginnings.

She's had much to draw on from her own life: She's been divorced (this is her fourth marriage), had high-profile jobs at Entertainment Tonight, Extra and Leeza, and seen her kids grow older. She became an activist for family caregivers as her mother and grandmother both had Alzheimer's.

She writes about navigating change, basking in one's past, handling disappointments, "test-driving our dreams," learning how to say no and embracing the "Goddess Quotient" – how to be "a good girlfriend to yourself."

As for her own big new beginning, Gibbons remembers how just a couple of years ago she privately worried about the age difference.

"I did play out all those fears," she says. "I went through the list: I've got kids, there's a lot in my life that is big and complicated, he should be starting a young family. I went through all of it. I decided that I needed to count my blessings and not my stretch marks. I recognized that my work in the relationship was not to decide what he felt about it."

In the end, she says, "It was up to Steven to decide how to receive. He didn't need me to protect him from our age difference. Now two years later, there's so much respect and so much fun and so much faith in each other. We truly are our biggest supporters. That's really love"

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New whooping cough strain in US raises questions

NEW YORK (AP) — Researchers have discovered the first U.S. cases of whooping cough caused by a germ that may be resistant to the vaccine.

Health officials are looking into whether cases like the dozen found in Philadelphia might be one reason the nation just had its worst year for whooping cough in six decades. The new bug was previously reported in Japan, France and Finland.

"It's quite intriguing. It's the first time we've seen this here," said Dr. Tom Clark of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The U.S. cases are detailed in a brief report from the CDC and other researchers in Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine.

Whooping cough is a highly contagious disease that can strike people of any age but is most dangerous to children. It was once common, but cases in the U.S. dropped after a vaccine was introduced in the 1940s.

An increase in illnesses in recent years has been partially blamed on a version of the vaccine used since the 1990s, which doesn't last as long. Last year, the CDC received reports of 41,880 cases, according to a preliminary count. That included 18 deaths.

The new study suggests that the new whooping cough strain may be why more people have been getting sick. Experts don't think it's more deadly, but the shots may not work as well against it.

In a small, soon-to-be published study, French researchers found the vaccine seemed to lower the risk of severe disease from the new strain in infants. But it didn't prevent illness completely, said Nicole Guiso of the Pasteur Institute, one of the researchers.

The new germ was first identified in France, where more extensive testing is routinely done for whooping cough. The strain now accounts for 14 percent of cases there, Guiso said.

In the United States, doctors usually rely on a rapid test to help make a diagnosis. The extra lab work isn't done often enough to give health officials a good idea how common the new type is here, experts said.

"We definitely need some more information about this before we can draw any conclusions," the CDC's Clark said.

The U.S. cases were found in the past two years in patients at St. Christopher's Hospital for Children in Philadelphia. One of the study's researchers works for a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson, which makes a version of the old whooping cough vaccine that is sold in other countries.

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JournaL: http://www.nejm.org

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Wall Street ends flat as investors pull back

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks ended mostly flat on Wednesday, taking another pause in the recent rally that has driven the S&P 500 to five-year highs, as transportation and technology shares lost ground.

Transportation stocks were among the worst performers. Shares of CH Robinson Worldwide fell 9.7 percent to $60.50 and the stock was the biggest percentage loser on the Nasdaq 100 after the freight transport company posted a lower-than-expected adjusted quarterly profit.

Without a strong catalyst, the market could struggle to continue its rally, analysts said. The benchmark S&P 500 index has advanced 6 percent this year, reaching its highest since December 2007, while the Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> has risen above 14,000 recently.

Bank of America-Merrill Lynch analysts see a near-term pullback likely, based on strong equity inflows at the start of the year, said Dan Suzuki, the bank's equity strategist in New York.

"The fact that we've gone since November without seeing one, from a timing perspective, it wouldn't be a surprise to see one now."

With fourth-quarter earnings nearing an end, the market will be losing one of its big supports, said Frank Lesh, a futures analyst and broker at FuturePath Trading LLC in Chicago. "That's one thing that's been holding the market up," he said.

Shares of Time Warner Inc jumped 4.1 percent to $52.01 after reporting higher fourth-quarter profit that beat Wall Street estimates, as growth in its cable networks offset declines in film, TV entertainment and publishing units.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> was up 7.22 points, or 0.05 percent, at 13,986.52. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> was up 0.83 points, or 0.05 percent, at 1,512.12. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> was down 3.10 points, or 0.10 percent, at 3,168.48.

Amazon.com shares, down 1.7 percent at $262.22, led the decline on the Nasdaq.

Also causing some strain on the market, investors have been speculating about leadership changes in Spain and Italy and watching for comments from European leaders, analysts said. European Central Bank policymakers are due to meet Thursday.

The Dow Jones Transportation average <.djt> was down 0.2 percent after hitting another record high on Tuesday. The average is up 10.7 percent for the year so far and has made a series of new highs since mid-January.

According to Thomson Reuters data, of 301 companies in the S&P 500 that have reported earnings, 68.1 percent have exceeded analysts' expectations, above a 62 percent average since 1994 and 65 percent over the past four quarters. In terms of revenue, 65.8 percent of companies have topped forecasts.

Fourth-quarter earnings for S&P 500 companies are estimated to have risen 4.7 percent, according to the data, above a 1.9 percent forecast at the start of the earnings season.

Walt Disney Co's stock was up 0.4 percent at $54.52, after the company beat estimates for quarterly adjusted earnings and gave an optimistic outlook for the next few quarters.

Volume was roughly 6.5 billion shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange, the Nasdaq and the NYSE MKT, compared with the 2012 average daily closing volume of about 6.45 billion.

Advancers outpaced decliners on the NYSE by roughly 17 to 12 and on the Nasdaq by about 13 to 11.

(Editing by Bernadette Baum, Kenneth Barry and Nick Zieminski)

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Obama Orders Release of Drone Memos to Lawmakers

WASHINGTON — The White House on Wednesday directed the Justice Department to release classified documents discussing the legal justification for the use of drones in targeting American citizens abroad who are considered terrorist to the two Congressional intelligence committees, according to an administration official.

The White House announcement appears to refer to a long, detailed 2010 memo from the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel justifying the killing of Anwar al-Awlaki, an American-born cleric who had joined Al Qaeda in Yemen. He was killed in a C.I.A. drone strike in September 2011. Members of Congress have long demanded access to the legal memorandum.

The decision to release the legal memos to the intelligence committees came under pressure, two days after a bipartisan group of 11 senators joined a growing chorus asking for more information about the legal justification for targeted killings, especially of Americans. The announcement also came on the eve of the confirmation hearing scheduled for Thursday for John O. Brennan, President Obama’s choice to be director of the C.I.A. As Mr. Obama’s counterterrorism adviser, Mr. Brennan has been the chief architect of the drone program, and he is expected to be closely questioned about it at the hearing of the Senate Intelligence Committee.

Critics noted that in 2009, Mr. Obama had ordered the public release of the classified memos governing C.I.A. interrogations under President George W. Bush and accused Mr. Obama of hypocrisy. Administration officials replied that the so-called enhanced interrogations had been stopped, while drone strikes continue.

Until Wednesday night, the administration had refused to even officially acknowledge the existence of the documents, which have been reported about in the press. This week, NBC News obtained an unclassified, shorter legal memo, described as a “white paper,” that officials said described the legal framework that officials follow in using the drones.

Administration officials said Mr. Obama had decided to take the action — which they described as extraordinary — out of a desire to involve Congress in the development of the legal framework for the use of drones. Aides noted that Mr. Obama had made a pledge to do that during an appearance on “The Daily Show” last year.

“Today, as part of the president’s ongoing commitment to consult with Congress on national security matters, the president directed the Department of Justice to provide the congressional Intelligence committees access to classified Office of Legal Counsel advice related to the subject of the Department of Justice White Paper,” the administration official said.

The official said that members of the intelligence committees would now get “access” to the documents. It remained unclear what kind of access that would be.

Christopher Anders, senior legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union, called the president’s move “a small step in the right direction.” But he noted that the legal memo or memos were not being shared with either of the armed services committees, which have jurisdiction over Pentagon strikes, or the judiciary committees, which oversee the Justice Department.

The public should be permitted to see at least a redacted version of the relevant memos, Mr. Anders said. “Everyone has a right to know when the government believes it can kill Americans and others,” he said.

The Congressional intelligence committees were created in the late 1970s to exercise oversight after a series of scandals at the spy agencies. The law requires that the committees be kept informed of intelligence activities. But most administrations withhold at least some legal opinions, treating them as confidential legal advice to the president and agency officials.

Senator Dianne Feinstein, the California Democrat who leads the Senate Intelligence Committee, had proposed a clause for the annual intelligence authorization bill requiring that legal opinions on relevant matters be routinely shared with the committees. But the White House objected, and the measure was dropped from the bill.

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Sean Eldridge, Husband of Facebook Co-Founder, Running for Congress

Sean Eldridge, an investor and the husband of Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes, has filed paperwork establishing a campaign for New York’s 19th Congressional District seat in 2014.

Eldridge, who is a frequent donor to Democratic candidates and committees, has publicly backed President Barack Obama and hopes to unseat two-term Republican Chris Gibson. This November, Gibson won reelection by a margin of 53 percent to 47 percent. However, the district also favored Obama.

Eldridge is a politically active Democrat and the CEO and founder of Hudson River Ventures LLC, a small business investment fund located in New York’s Hudson Valley. He also serves as an adviser to Freedom to Marry, a campaign to win marriage equality nationwide.

The 26-year-old is married to entrepreneur Chris Hughes, who is both a co-founder of Facebook and the publisher of The New Republic magazine.

Bloomberg.com reported that Eldridge’s statement of organization, which created “Sean Eldridge for Congress,” accompanied by a statement of candidacy, was processed by the Federal Election Commission last week.

Born in 1986, if Eldridge wins the congressional seat, he’ll be just 27, making him one of the youngest members of Congress in 2014.

Rep. Aaron Shock, a Republican from Illinois, was elected to his congressional seat when he was 27. He is now the youngest representative, at age 31.

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See the Stylish Photo Shoot Jessica Simpson Did Between Babies

Stylewatch
Style News Now

02/05/2013 at 04:00 PM ET

Courtesy Jessica Simpson Collection

Jessica Simpson is no stranger to buzzworthy photoshoots, but the glamorous shots she snapped for her Spring 2013 clothing line may take the cake.

The sunlit campaign photos, shot in November on Malibu’s El Matador Beach by famed fashion photographer Ellen von Unwerth, show the mom-to-be showing off her fab, Harley Pasternak-toned bod in pieces from her clothing, shoe and sunglasses collections.

“Last fall’s campaign was shot while I was pregnant [with daughter Maxwell Drew] so I worked behind the scenes on the shoot,” Simpson tells PEOPLE exclusively. “I was really excited to be back in front of the camera for this year’s campaign.”

Of the photographer, Simpson gushes: “Ellen is incredible and was able to really capture the essence of the spring collection – it’s playful, all-American, classic.” Simpson demonstrates those qualities herself as she poses in items from a tie-dye skirt to a denim romper, sky-high neutral wedges to cheetah-print sunglasses — all while rocking her signature loose blonde waves, smoky eyes and light pink lips.

And the final word on the collection, straight from the star? “I want everyone to be able to wear my designs,” she says of the pieces, which are almost entirely under $200 and are starting to ship to stores including Macy’s and Nordstrom now. “The collection is accessible — from extra-small to plus and maternity, there is something for everyone to feel great in.”

Click to see another exclusive image from the campaign, then tell us: Are you excited to try on Jessica Simpson’s spring collection?

Courtesy Jessica Simpson Collection

–Alex Apatoff

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Critics seek to delay NYC sugary drinks size limit

NEW YORK (AP) — Opponents are pressing to delay enforcement of the city's novel plan to crack down on supersized, sugary drinks, saying businesses shouldn't have to spend millions of dollars to comply until a court rules on whether the measure is legal.

With the rule set to take effect March 12, beverage industry, restaurant and other business groups have asked a judge to put it on hold at least until there's a ruling on their lawsuit seeking to block it altogether. The measure would bar many eateries from selling high-sugar drinks in cups or containers bigger than 16 ounces.

"It would be a tremendous waste of expense, time, and effort for our members to incur all of the harm and costs associated with the ban if this court decides that the ban is illegal," Chong Sik Le, president of the New York Korean-American Grocers Association, said in court papers filed Friday.

City lawyers are fighting the lawsuit and oppose postponing the restriction, which the city Board of Health approved in September. They said Tuesday they expect to prevail.

"The obesity epidemic kills nearly 6,000 New Yorkers each year. We see no reason to delay the Board of Health's reasonable and legal actions to combat this major, growing problem," Mark Muschenheim, a city attorney, said in a statement.

Another city lawyer, Thomas Merrill, has said officials believe businesses have had enough time to get ready for the new rule. He has noted that the city doesn't plan to seek fines until June.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg and other city officials see the first-of-its-kind limit as a coup for public health. The city's obesity rate is rising, and studies have linked sugary drinks to weight gain, they note.

"This is the biggest step a city has taken to curb obesity," Bloomberg said when the measure passed.

Soda makers and other critics view the rule as an unwarranted intrusion into people's dietary choices and an unfair, uneven burden on business. The restriction won't apply at supermarkets and many convenience stores because the city doesn't regulate them.

While the dispute plays out in court, "the impacted businesses would like some more certainty on when and how they might need to adjust operations," American Beverage Industry spokesman Christopher Gindlesperger said Tuesday.

Those adjustments are expected to cost the association's members about $600,000 in labeling and other expenses for bottles, Vice President Mike Redman said in court papers. Reconfiguring "16-ounce" cups that are actually made slightly bigger, to leave room at the top, is expected to take cup manufacturers three months to a year and cost them anywhere from more than $100,000 to several millions of dollars, Foodservice Packaging Institute President Lynn Dyer said in court documents.

Movie theaters, meanwhile, are concerned because beverages account for more than 20 percent of their overall profits and about 98 percent of soda sales are in containers greater than 16 ounces, according to Robert Sunshine, executive director of the National Association of Theatre Owners of New York State.

___

Follow Jennifer Peltz at http://twitter.com/jennpeltz

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Wall Street bounces back after sell-off; results a boost

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks climbed on Tuesday, recovering a day after the market's biggest sell-off since November, as stronger-than-expected earnings brightened the profit picture.

Dell Inc's stock rose after the world's No. 3 computer maker agreed to be taken private in a $24.4 billion deal, the largest leveraged buyout since the 2008-2009 financial crisis. The stock gained 1.1 percent to $13.42.

All 10 S&P sectors were higher, and the S&P 500 and Nasdaq gained more than 1 percent.

The market's bounce follows a sell-off on Monday that gave the S&P 500 its biggest percentage decline since mid-November. The benchmark remains up 6 percent since the start of the year and is less than 4 percent away from its all-time closing high of 1,565.15 from October 2007.

Analysts said fourth-quarter results have been among factors helping to boost stocks. On Tuesday, Archer Daniels Midland reported revenue and adjusted fourth-quarter earnings that beat expectations, boosted by strong global demand for oilseeds. Shares rose 3.3 percent to $29.38.

"There's not a huge upside surprise by any means, but we're definitely seeing slightly better-than-expected earnings overall," said Bryant Evans, portfolio manager at Cozad Asset Management, in Champaign, Illinois.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> was up 99.22 points, or 0.71 percent, at 13,979.30. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> was up 15.58 points, or 1.04 percent, at 1,511.29. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> was up 40.41 points, or 1.29 percent, at 3,171.58.

The market shot higher at the start of the year after U.S. lawmakers were able to come to a last-minute agreement to avoid a national "fiscal cliff," but questions on spending cuts remain.

President Barack Obama on Tuesday urged Congress to pass a small package of spending cuts and tax reforms. Though the plan was quickly rebuffed by Republican leaders, investors are looking for an agreement.

"I think there's some hopefulness out there that a reasonable compromise will be made," Evans said.

Also in earnings, Estée Lauder Cos Inc reported a higher quarterly profit and raised its full-year profit forecast. The stock rose 6 percent to $64.71.

With results in from more than half of the S&P 500 companies, 69 percent have beaten profit expectations, compared with the 62 percent average since 1994 and the 65 percent average over the past four quarters. Sixty-six percent of companies have beaten on revenue.

Fourth-quarter earnings for S&P 500 companies are expected to rise 4.5 percent, according to the data, above the 1.9 percent forecast at the start of earnings season.

On the down side, McGraw-Hill shares slumped 10.7 percent to $44.92 after the U.S. Justice Department filed a civil lawsuit seeking $5 billion over mortgage bond ratings. Standard & Poor's, a McGraw Hill unit, was accused of inflating ratings and understating risk out of a desire to gain more business from investment banks.

On Monday, McGraw-Hill stock suffered its worst one-day decline since the 1987 market crash.

Volume was roughly 6.7 billion shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange, the Nasdaq and the NYSE MKT, compared with the 2012 average daily closing volume of about 6.45 billion.

Advancers outpaced decliners on the NYSE by nearly 11 to 4 and on the Nasdaq by about 3 to 1.

(Editing by Kenneth Barry and Nick Zieminski)

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Bulgaria Implicates Hezbollah in Deadly Israeli Bus Blast

Reuters

Bulgaria's Burgas airport on July 18 after an explosion on a bus carrying Israeli tourists outside the airport.

SOFIA, Bulgaria — The clues to a fatal bomb attack on Israeli vacationers in Bulgaria included a charred tour bus, a decapitated head and a fake driver’s license.

With help from the United States and Israel, investigators here broke the case — and linked it to Hezbollah — using a tip from a secret source and a some old-fashioned detective work, tracing the printer that had produced two forged licenses back to Lebanon.

On Tuesday, Bulgaria’s interior minister, Tsvetan Tsvetanov, announced that two of the people behind the July 18 bombing, which killed five Israeli tourists, a Bulgarian bus driver and the bomber, were believed to be members of the military wing of Hezbollah.

Though investigators did not release names, they identified two of the plotters as a man with an Australian passport, believed to be the bombmaker, and a man with a Canadian passport, both of whom lived in Lebanon.

“We have followed their entire activities in Australia and Canada, so we have information about financing and their membership in Hezbollah,” Mr. Tsvetanov said at a news conference.

Hezbollah has denied responsibility for the bombing.

The announcement could force the European Union to reconsider designating the Lebanon-based group as a terrorist organization and cracking down on its fund-raising. That would upend Europe’s policy of quiet tolerance of the group, which, in addition to operating schools and social services, is an influential force in Middle East politics, considers Israel an enemy and has extensive links with Iran.

Mr. Tsvetanov did not mention Iran, but the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said in a statement on Tuesday, “This is yet a further corroboration of what we have already known, that Hezbollah and its Iranian patrons are orchestrating a worldwide campaign of terror that is spanning countries and continents.”

The United States, too, urged the European Union to condemn Hezbollah. John O. Brennan, President Obama’s chief counterterrorism adviser and his nominee to run the C.I.A., responded in a statement Tuesday: “We call on our European partners as well as other members of the international community to take proactive action to uncover Hezbollah’s infrastructure and disrupt the group’s financing schemes and operational networks in order to prevent future attacks.”

But countries including France and Germany have been wary of taking that step, which could force confrontations with large numbers of Hezbollah supporters living within their borders.

Catherine Ashton, the European Union’s high representative for foreign policy, responded with caution. “The implications of the investigation need to be assessed seriously as they relate to a terrorist attack on E.U. soil, which resulted in the killing and injury of innocent civilians,” she said in a statement.

Secretary of State John Kerry called Ms. Ashton to discuss the danger presented by Hezbollah, among other issues, including his statement on Tuesday urging governments around the world, particularly in Europe, “to take immediate action to crack down on Hezbollah.” Asked if Mr. Kerry had pressed the European Union to blacklist Hezbollah, Victoria Nuland, a State Department spokeswoman, said Ms. Ashton “knows where we want to go.”

New details continued to emerge about the bombing, which analysts have called an episode in a shadow war pitting Israel against Iran and Hezbollah. Israel is believed to be behind the killings of Iranian nuclear scientists. Operatives of the Iranian Quds Force, an elite international operations unit within the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, in turn were blamed in plots against Israeli targets in Thailand, India, Georgia and elsewhere.

Amin Hotait, a retired general in the Lebanese Army who is close to Hezbollah, said the Bulgarian decision “lacks unequivocal evidence.”

“The party doesn’t usually retaliate against Israeli attacks by killing civilians,” Mr. Hotait said. “This decision is political in nature, since Bulgaria is not an independent country, but politically dependent on the West.”

After the attack, Mr. Netanyahu immediately blamed Hezbollah and Iran. United States officials privately supported that view, based on intercepted communications.

Bulgarian officials, wary about jumping to conclusions and concerned about alienating European Union allies, needed more proof before they would determine that the attack had been the work of Hezbollah.

Indeed, Mr. Tsvetanov chose his words carefully on Tuesday, leaving room for uncertainty. “A reasonable assumption, I repeat a reasonable assumption, can be made that the two of them were members of the militant wing of Hezbollah,” he said.

Nicholas Kulish and Matthew Brunwasser reported from Sofia, and Eric Schmitt from Washington. Jodi Rudoren contributed reporting from Jerusalem; Hwaida Saad from Beirut, Lebanon; and Michael R. Gordon from Washington.

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Zynga profit tops views, but it forecasts lower revenue

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Zynga Inc, the one-time Silicon Valley darling that has been wrestling with a months-long exodus of online gamers, reported an unexpected fourth-quarter profit on Tuesday after embracing steep cuts and shifting forward deferred revenue.

The results assuaged investors who had feared the company might be in free fall and boosted Zynga shares by 7 percent to $ 2.93 in after-hours trade.

Still, the company reported fourth-quarter revenues of $ 311 million, virtually unchanged from a year ago and down from the prior quarter. And Zynga’s underlying business appeared to be continuing its downward slide, as the maker of “CityVille 2″ and other games projected revenue could shrink for a third sequential quarter.

Zynga forecast revenue for the first quarter of 2013 of between $ 255 million and $ 265 million, a roughly 20 percent drop from the same quarter in 2012.

The company attributed the weak sales forecast to a “light slate” of new games planned for quarter.

“The highlight was it was a good quarter and good free cash flow but outlook and guidance is somewhat cloudy,” said Arvind Bhatia, a Sterne Agee analyst.

Once hailed as one of Silicon Valley’s fastest growing companies, Zynga suffered a dramatic reversal in 2012, when users began to abandon its red-hot games like “CityVille.” The company was also caught off-guard by a sweeping, permanent change in consumer behavior, as people spent more time on their mobile phones instead of desktop computers – the platform for Zynga’s most lucrative, Facebook-based games.

The company went public in late 2011 at $ 10 a share. By November, its stock had dipped as low as $ 2.10, a price that valued the company only narrowly above the value of its securities, cash and assets.

But Zynga on Tuesday reported a quarterly profit of 1 cent per share on an adjusted basis, beating expectations for a loss of 3 cents per share, according to analysts polled by Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

COST CUTTING

In October, Zynga’a chief executive, Mark Pincus, laid off staff and announced $ 200 million in stock buybacks after the company forecast a loss for the December quarter.

To begin the company’s turnaround, he also vowed to make smartphone-based games a centerpiece of Zynga’s line-up, and to crack down on internal delays that affected game launches.

Excluding certain items such as one-time stock compensation costs, Zynga achieved profitability by sharply paring costs on research and development and administration, as well as by shifting forward $ 50 million in future guaranteed revenue to be counted in the current quarter.

New bookings fell to $ 261.2 million, a decline of 15 percent from a year ago.

Executives told analysts on Tuesday’s conference call that the company would adopt a more conservative game development strategy and discard titles that fail to become hits – a departure from earlier days when the high-flying startup spent lavishly on developing a wide array of game offerings.

For instance, CityVille 2, the sequel to Zynga’s most successful game to date, would be shuttered because it was underperforming, executives said.

“Not every launch was a success,” said Chief Operating Officer David Ko. “We’re taking a more disciplined approach to managing our game portfolio.”

FACEBOOK TIES UNRAVELED

Zynga’s management also played up the strength of its own gamer network, weeks after Zynga and Facebook dissolved a longstanding partnership that gave Zynga beneficial privileges on the Facebook platform.

For years, Zynga and Facebook enjoyed a closely symbiotic relationship: The world’s No. 1 social network fed new gamers to Zynga games by tweaking its recommendations algorithms and exposing Zynga games to Facebook users, while Zynga funneled millions in fees back to Facebook.

But Facebook has recently courted other developers to make games on its platform to diversify its revenue streams, while Pincus pushed Zynga to make itself less dependent on Facebook and more focused on mobile games.

Pincus told analysts Tuesday that the company’s own gamer network and websites, rather than Facebook, now represents Zynga’s “most important distribution channel.”

In an interview, Barry Cottle, Zynga’s chief revenue officer, said more than two-thirds of new game downloads were spurred by social communication tools Zynga developed for its own players, and that Zynga could harness social gaming without Facebook.

“We have a strong audience base through our own channels,” Cottle said. “And we’ve got a lot of experience here at Zynga that was built on understanding how players like to interact in games.”

(Reporting By Gerry Shih; Editing by Leslie Adler and M.D. Golan)

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