HONG KONG

Amway Asia Pacific Ltd. Earnings Rise: The company, a unit of Amway Corp., said its earnings for the first quarter ended Nov. 30 rose slightly over the year-earlier period despite an 11% drop in sales. The Hong Kong-based company, the exclusive distributor of Amway consumer products in Australia and several Asian countries, said its results in November were hurt by the suspension of sponsoring activities in China. On Nov. 1, the company announced that it was halting activity there pending a Chinese government review of all multilevel marketing companies. That suspension continues to hurt the company in the second quarter, but Amway said it should be able to resume sponsorship activities in China this month.