Also . . .

ITT Corp.’s fourth-quarter profit before a charge rose 31% as demand for upscale hotel rooms allowed it to raise room rates at its Sheraton chain. ITT, which also owns the Caesars World casinos, is being bought by Starwood Hotels & Resorts Trust for $14.6 billion. ITT shareholders will vote on the purchase today. The company earned $89 million, or 74 cents a diluted share, before a charge, up from $68 million, or 59 cents, a year earlier. The results were in line with estimates.

* Allstate Corp.’s fourth-quarter earnings rose 34% as the insurer benefited from milder weather that reined in property claims. Profit, excluding one-time gains at the largest publicly traded U.S. insurer of homes and autos, rose to $691 million, or $1.60 a diluted share, from $514 million, or $1.15, a year ago. The results surpassed the $1.34 average forecast by analysts.

* Fruit of the Loom Inc. said it will form a parent company in the Cayman Islands, allowing the struggling underwear maker to take advantage of financing and tax incentives unavailable in the U.S. Under Cayman Islands regulations, the holding company could avoid paying corporate income tax on profit generated outside the country, Chicago-based Fruit of the Loom said. The move comes amid declining sales at the maker of Fruit of the Loom and BVD underwear.

* The 108-year-old Dutch publisher of professional journals Wolters Kluwer said it plans to buy Waverly Inc., the U.S. publisher of Stedman’s Medical Dictionary, for $375 million to strengthen its medical publishing and gain a higher U.S. profile.

* Mobil Corp. restructured its operating divisions into seven groups a week after the second-largest U.S. oil company named Eugene Renna as its new president.