Macy’s to hire 86,000 temporary workers

Department store giant Macy’s Inc. is bulking up its holiday ranks with 86,000 temporary positions, the latest retailer to boost seasonal hiring in preparation for the upcoming shopping season.

The Cincinnati-based company said it is hiring about 3,000 more seasonal workers than last year to staff its Macy’s and Bloomingdale’s stores, call centers and distribution centers during the holidays.

Other retailers such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Kohl’s are also boosting their holiday hiring.

The ramp-up in temporary hiring could benefit more than 800,000 workers in the last months of the year, the highest level since 1999, according to career counseling firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc.

$23.5B withdrawn from Total Return Fund

Investors pulled a record $23.5 billion from Pacific Investment Management’s Total Return Fund in September, the month "bond king" Bill Gross quit, intensifying the outflows that began last year after returns turned spotty at the enormous mutual fund.

It was the largest monthly decline in net assets ever recorded at Total Return, long the flagship of the Newport Beach, Calif.-based Pimco funds. The largest outflow occurred Sept. 26, Pimco said, when Gross announced he was joining far smaller rival Janus Capital Group. His departure came after clashes with other Pimco executives.

At its present size, Total Return has about $200 billion in assets — a little more than a tenth of the nearly $2 trillion that remains invested with Pimco.