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It's WNYC's Financial 411, our take on the economic news of the day. Stock markets swung from negative to positive and then back to negative throughout the day after a report that retail sales increased only slightly in July.

For the day, the Dow Jones lost nearly 17 points to close at 10,303. The Nasdaq fell 17 points as well, ending at 2,173. The S&P 500 was off 4 points, closing at 1,079. For the week, the Dow Jones lost more than 350 points.

That Commerce Department report found that total retail sales increased 0.4 percent last month. While an improvement from the previous month, the rise was largely due to consumers paying for higher gasoline prices and increased car sales. It has analysts like Ken Perkins, president of retail metrics, concerned. "Job worries continue to pervade so many parents' minds right now so they are really limiting their spending, so our sense is it's going to be soft and these July numbers are the type of momentum that retailers want to see building into the back to school selling season," Perkins says.

After holiday spending, back-to-school sales are the biggest sales period for retailers.

Update: Grimaldi's Gets a Reprieve

Speaking of sales, yesterday on the Financial 411, WNYC's Ilya Marritz reported that Brooklyn icon Grimaldi's Pizzeria could face possible eviction if it lost at a court hearing today. But instead a judge gave the popular restaurant a reprieve.

Ilya, what exactly happened in court today?

Well, the landlord of Grimaldi's, which is the Waxman family, had sought to evict Grimaldi's and the owner, Frank Ciolli, for failure to pay rent and also back taxes. But Ciolli told the judge today that he has the money. He's ready to pay it, and the judge said OK, get these tens of thousands of dollars to the Waxman family by Monday and you can hang onto your lease.

Will the owner be able to make the payment?
Frank Ciolli says he can make the payment. I spoke with him afterward outside on the pavement and he said the money has been there for a long time and he can pay it.

How did the landlord react?
The Waxman family is disappointed. They said Grimaldi's has actually been causing them trouble for quite some time and the restaurant's lease is up in November 2011 and the Waxmans say they are talking to other operators of pizza restaurants who might want to move into that space.

The Business Week in Review

And now to review some of this week's local business news with our regular Friday guest, Greg David, Director of the Business and Economics Reporting Program at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism.

It seemed that every day this week, we heard another gloomy report about the state of the nation's economy.  But here in New York City, we had some good news. Here's Mayor Michael Bloomberg on Wednesday: "Just think about that -- the economy turns down in America and around the world, and we're gonna have a record year in tourism." The city is on track to host more than 47 million visitors this year, up 4 percent from last year. Why is tourism so strong in New York?

Tourism is so strong in New York because we're irresistible, frankly. I get off the train at Times Square, where I work, and I come up the escalator and they're lined out the block to buy MetroCards and we're not talking about New Yorkers standing in line to do that. Look, they're coming from abroad, they're coming from the rest of the country. The most interesting thing in the results, though, is that Amtrak passengers into New York are up 10 percent. That means people in the Northeast that do feel constrained by the recession, instead of going someplace else are hopping on the train and presumably driving and coming to spend a couple of days in New York.

A lot of those tourists come through JFK airport which was in the news quite a bit this week. Delta Airlines announced a billion-dollar plan to renovate its terminal at the airport. The next day, reports that American Airlines wants to create a "premiere" terminal with its overseas partners. And grabbing the most headlines, JetBlue's rogue flight attendant, Stephen "Deploy the Slide" Slater.  Where to start? Seriously, why so much construction at JFK?

Well, first of all, New York is the largest aviation market in the world and all those tourists are coming. But remember, we've got consolidation. The merger of Northwest and Delta and now the coming merger of United and Continental. American's desperate to keep up. And you know, JFK's an important airport.  It's been overhauled in some ways, but many of the terminals are still bad. Delta wanted to do this in 2001. The terrorist attacks and the recession after that derailed it. Now it's back on track. These airlines have to have facilities at JFK that keep them competitive.

Finally this week, several local businesses in financial straits. First, the boardroom intrigue at struggling bookstore Barnes & Noble. Then today we learned that retailer Gracious Home filed for bankruptcy. And finally, grocery store A&P, owner of Food Emporium and Pathmark, announced it will close 25 stores in five states. Even if New York City's economy overall is doing better than other places, we're not immune to the economic slowdown here.

Absolutely not. Remember, Gracious Home has been up and down for a while, but you know this is a different story. It's a story we've seen play out a lot in New York. The homegrown New York retailer has a hard time surviving because of the onslaught of national retailers who provide great value. Gracious Home is in a very competitive category: furniture, home sales. I don't know, you've heard all those Bob's discount store commercials. They're in town now.  It's a tough road to hoe. You've got to be really good if you're a local chain.