David Kellermann, the acting chief financial officer of mortgage giant Freddie Mac, was found dead at his home Wednesday morning in what police said was an apparent suicide, the Associated Press reported. Mary Ann Jennings, director of public information for the Fairfax County, Va., Police Department, said Kellermann was found dead in his home. The 41-year-old Kellermann had been Freddie Mac’s chief financial officer since September.

Sioux City-based Terra Industries Inc. announced yesterday that its 2009 first-quarter income was $30 million, or 30 cents per share, compared with $100.2 million, or 97 cents per share, during the same period a year ago. Revenues for the first quarter totaled $419.8 million, compared with $574.7 million during the first quarter of 2008. The company said the $154.9 million decrease in revenues was due primarily to lower ammonia selling prices and urea ammonium nitrate and ammonium nitrate sales volumes, which were in response to the soft global demand. Terra declared a dividend of 10 cents per share, payable June 9 to holders on record as of May 20.

Morgan Stanley today reported a bigger-than-anticipated loss in the first quarter, as the revenue at the company’s equity sales and trading business plunged 74 percent from a year ago, Fortune reported. The Wall Street investment bank said it lost $177 million, or 57 cents per share, in the quarter ended March 31; analysts were expecting a loss of 8 cents a share, according to Reuters. The company reported a net loss to common shareholders of $578 million.

The Iowa Alliance for Wind Innovation and Novel Development (IAWIND), a project led by the University of Iowa College of Engineering, has received a $3 million, three-year grant from the Iowa Power Fund. The grant will go toward research implementation, education and evaluation of testing needs expressed by numerous wind-energy companies. According to P. Barry Butler, dean of the College of Engineering, the grant means that the collaborative project, which started in 2008, will be able to continue to help the state attract wind-energy companies and related industries in an effort to enhance Iowa’s position as a U.S. leader in wind-generated energy.

House of Mercy, a mission initiative of Mercy Medical Center – Des Moines, will host its fourth annual Helping Lives Bloom, A Garden Gala, on Friday from 6:30 to 10 p.m. at Embassy Suites on the River. Tickets can be purchased by calling the Mercy Foundation at (515) 247-3248. The cost of the event is $100, which includes music, a social hour, dinner and auctions. Last year’s event raised more than $170,000 for House of Mercy, which is dedicated to improving the lives of women struggling with drug addiction and unexpected pregnancies.

The American Wind Energy Association said Des Moines-based MidAmerican Energy Co. and its Portland, Ore.-based subsidiary, PacifiCorp, rank first among U.S. electric utilities for ownership of wind farms, the Associated Press reported. MidAmerican and its western subsidiary own wind farms with nearly 2,000 megawatts of capacity, with PacifiCorp owning nearly half of that power. PacifiCorp operates in parts of California, Idaho, Oregon, Utah, Washington and Wyoming. It also buys wind and biomass power from other operators and is an investor in a solar-energy project in the Mojave Desert.

Dubuque-based Flexsteel Industries Inc. yesterday reported net sales of $73.6 million for the quarter ended March 31, which is a decrease of 25 percent compared with the same period last year, when the company reported net sales of $98.1 million. Flexsteel reported a net loss of $1.9 million, or 28 cents per share, compared with net income of $0.8 million, or 13 cents per share, during the same period a year ago.