Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc reported an 83 percent jump in quarterly profit and said it would spin off its timeshare business to focus on its core hotels business.Shares of the owner of the St. Regis and Sheraton brands of hotels rose 5 percent to $74.80, making them the top percentage gainer among S&P 500 constituents in premarket trading.Starwood's timeshare business allows customers to purchase vacation time for use at a specified time during the year. The business generated revenue of about $640 million in 2014, or nearly 11 percent of the company's annual revenue.After flat to declining revenue growth for four straight quarters, revenue in the business increased 15.2 percent in the fourth quarter ended Dec. 31.
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc. (Starwood) is hotel and Leisure Company. Shares of HOT fell by 0.6% or $-0.43/share to $71.23. In the past year, the shares have traded as low as $68.53 and as high as $86.11. On average, 2291880 shares of HOT exchange hands on a given day and today's volume is recorded at 4367174.
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