Business news in brief

CDI Corp. will cut its staff by 65 to 75 employees, the Philadelphia engineering and staffing company said Monday. It will also consolidate facilities, though it did not specify which ones. To accomplish the staff cuts, CDI will incur a restructuring charge of $4 million to $5 million in the fourth quarter. The company, which has offices around the United States, employs 800 people as well as 9,000 contractors deployed as part of CDI's staffing organization. The cuts would primarily come from the 800, focused on employees working in sales and administration. Leaving as part of the restructuring is Philip L. Clark, the company's executive vice president of global business development and operations. In its most recent quarter, CDI reported declines in revenues and profits, with challenges in its government, high-tech, and recruiting businesses. Aerospace engineering work has also declined. - Jane M. Von Bergen

The continuing cutbacks and restructuring at Merck & Co. include the loss of 152 jobs based in Upper Gwynedd, Montgomery County, when the drugmaker sold marketing rights to the drug Saphris to Forest Laboratories in early December. As part of that, Merck filed a WARN notice (named for the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act) that indicated the layoffs of Saphris sales representatives would be effective Feb. 3, 2014. Merck said Oct. 1 that it was cutting 8,500 more jobs from its global workforce. About 500 jobs were cut from the facility in West Point, according to a WARN notice posted later in October. Meanwhile, the local steelworkers union website said that 40 to 45 union workers might lose jobs at West Point in early January. - David Sell

The number of Americans who signed contracts to buy existing homes in November was essentially unchanged from October, suggesting sales are stabilizing after several months of declines. The National Association of Realtors said its seasonally adjusted pending home sales index ticked up to 101.7 from 101.5 in October. The pending home sales index had fallen for five straight months before November. - Associated Press

Wells Fargo & Co., the largest U.S. home lender, agreed to pay Fannie Mae $591 million to resolve repurchase demands on loans originated before 2009 and sold to the government-backed firm. Wells Fargo paid $541 million in cash to Fannie Mae after adjusting for prior repurchases, the San Francisco-based lender said in a statement. Wells Fargo reached a $869 million accord with Freddie Mac in September to resolve disputes on a similar subset of loans. - Bloomberg News

Cooper Tire & Rubber Co. is calling off its proposed $2.2 billion sale to India's Apollo Tyres Ltd., a deal that would have created the world's seventh largest tire company. The Findlay, Ohio, company said that financing is no longer available and continues to claim, as it has for months, that Apollo breached the terms of the agreement. The boards of both companies and Cooper shareholders had approved the buyout, but negotiations with the union representing Cooper employees became a sticking point. - AP

Fisker Automotive Inc. founder Henrik Fisker and the hybrid carmaker's former directors were sued by investor Atlas Capital Management L.P. over $2 million in losses it allegedly suffered in the company's collapse. Fisker misled investors about its financial health by failing to disclose problems with a government loan and keeping secret a 2011 safety recall while the company raised money, according to the complaint filed Dec. 27 in federal court in Wilmington. Fisker, based in Anaheim, Calif., filed for bankruptcy Nov. 22 listing assets of as much as $500 million and debt of as much as $1 billion in papers filed in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware. - Bloomberg News

Samsung said a 110-inch TV that has four times the resolution of standard high-definition TVs is going on sale for about $150,000 in South Korea. The launch Monday of the giant television set reflects global TV makers' move toward ultra-HD TVs, as manufacturing bigger TVs using OLED proves too costly. - AP

Boeing has told Seattle political leaders that this week's vote by machinists will determine the fate of some jobs on the new 777X airplane. Local politicians said Boeing executive Ray Conner told them that an accepted contract would ensure that the wing work stays in the Puget Sound area while a vote to reject the deal would ensure the jobs go elsewhere. Kent, Wash., Mayor Suzette Cooke said there was no other choice but to vote yes. Local union leaders say the contract involves too many concessions, including a plan to shift workers away from traditional pensions. - AP