Business news in brief

The State of New Jersey is accusing Credit Suisse Securities and two affiliates of misrepresenting the risks involved in the sale of more than $10 billion in residential mortgage-backed securities. In a lawsuit filed Wednesday, the state said Credit Suisse did not disclose to investors that underwriting guidelines had been abandoned in the sales. The suit says investors were also not told that numerous loan originators had poor track records and that some had even been suspended from doing business with Credit Suisse. New York state filed a similar suit last year. - Associated Press

FlowMetric, a Doylestown firm specializing in flow cytometry, has hired Rachel A. Bunting to lead its business development unit. Bunting will oversee a portfolio of FlowMetric clients and seek to expand the company's share of the preclinical and early-phase drug development markets. Bunting is an expert in polychromatic flow cytometry and immunology-based assays, having worked for more than seven years as a scientist at Janssen Pharmaceuticals, a Johnson & Johnson company. - Inquirer staff

Martha Krebs, executive director of strategic initiatives at the University of California at Davis office of research, has been appointed senior scientist in Pennsylvania State University's College of Engineering and principal investigator and director of the Energy Efficient Buildings (EEB) Hub at the Navy Yard, effective Dec. 1. "Martha brings a dynamic range of superior academic, public- and private-sector credentials to the EEB Hub, including her tenure as assistant secretary at the Department of Energy," said Rodney Erickson, Penn State president. Krebs replaces Laurie Actman, who has resumed her duties as EEB Hub deputy director after serving as interim director since Aug. 1. - Inquirer staff

Moody's Investor Service on Tuesday lowered the outlook for New Jersey to negative from stable, in part because tax collections are behind expectations due to a sluggish economic recovery. Moody's did not alter the state's debt rating, which remains Aa3 - its fourth-highest investment-grade rating. The firm says the state has a relatively high amount of debt, lacks a specific plan to build up fund balances, and is facing difficulty because of increasing pension obligations. Moody's says it could revise the outlook back to stable if there is sustained tax revenue improvement. - Associated Press

JPMorgan Chase & Co. is suing the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. to recover more than $1 billion tied to its purchase of Washington Mutual when that bank failed in 2008. In a federal court complaint, the New York bank said that the FDIC failed to honor obligations under the Washington Mutual agreement, and that that has subjected JP Morgan to massive liability. The FDIC became the receiver for Washington Mutual during the largest bank failure in U.S. history. JPMorgan said the FDIC then made promises to indemnify or protect the bank against liabilities if it stepped in. JPMorgan said in a court filing Tuesday that the FDIC then declined to acknowledge that claims against JPMorgan for Washington Mutual's conduct should have been claims against the receivership. - Associated Press

GlaxoSmithKline Plc and Theravance Inc. won approval for the second lung drug in their partnership aimed at treating the third-leading cause of death in the United States. The Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday cleared Anoro Ellipta for chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder, an umbrella term for emphysema and chronic bronchitis. Anoro is the first in a competition with companies including Novartis AG and Forest Laboratories Inc. to combine two drugs that relax airways. The once-daily dry powder inhaler may generate $1.2 billion in sales in 2016, according to the average of eight analysts' estimates compiled by Bloomberg. - Bloomberg News

Boeing Co. promoted Dennis Muilenburg, who runs its defense unit, to the new post of chief operating officer as the airplane-maker begins planning for an eventual successor to chief executive officer Jim McNerney. Muilenburg, 49, has managed Boeing's defense and space unit through an era of Pentagon cost-cutting, shrinking operations to match falling revenue and making the call this year to end production of the C-17 transport by 2015. The unit accounted for 36 percent of the Chicago-based company's third-quarter sales, down from 49 percent for all of 2010. "Today's promotions signal to us that Muilenburg is the anointed heir apparent - though it could be a couple of years before he actually gets promoted to the top slot," Robert Stallard, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets, said in a note to clients. - Bloomberg News