RSS Updates
Email Updates
Today before the close of the market, former Fed-Head Alan Greenspan participated in an interview on CNBC with Maria Bartoromo. The good news is that he’s no longer hard to understand at all. The bad news is that he’s no longer hard to understand at all. You might be able to blame part of the late day selling on him, at least in Fannie Mae (NYSE: FNM) or Freddie Mac (NYSE: FRE).
Monthly Archives: July 2008
Greenspan’s Recession Odds: Tales From Crypt Keeper (FNM, FRE)
lululemon Files Share Registration For Canadians (LULU)
lululemon athletica (NASDAQ: LULU) has just come out and filed to sell up to more than 20.9 million shares in a secondary offering. The company says that it may issue these upon the redemption, retraction or purchase of an equivalent number of the exchangeable shares of Lulu Canadian Holding, Inc. (an indirect wholly-owned subsidiary), or upon the liquidation, dissolution or winding up of Lulu Canada.
The 52-Week Low Club 7/31/2008 (DLX)(UMC)(BA)(AKAM)(HOLX)(BARE)
Deluxe Corporation (DLX) Drops 2008 outlook and pays the price. Falls to $14 from 52-week high of $40.86.
United Microelectronics (UMC) Fails with weak results and analyst upgrade. Sells off to $2.53 from 52-week high of $4.48
Boeing (BA) Concerns about plane orders as airline industry falls apart. Down to $61.06 from 52-week high of $107.15
Akamai Technologies (AKAM) Poor outlook for balance of the year. Sells off to $22.69 from 52-week high of $41.45.
Hologic (HOLX) Lowers sales forecasts. Dips to $18.18 from 52-week high of $36.44
Bare Essentials (BARE) Analyst downgrade. Plunges to $11.40 from 52-week high of $29.90
Douglas A. McIntyre
Newspapers Continue To Suck Wind (GCI)(NYT)(MNI)(CVC)NWS)
Just when you think that the newspaper business could not get any more depressing along comes a report that Advance Publications Inc. will sell the Newark Star-Ledger, New Jersey’s biggest circulation paper, unless 26 percent of the employees accept buyouts by October 1.
The company also wants new concessions from unions representing its drivers and mailers, according to the Associated Press. Its smaller paper in Trenton, the Times of Trenton, must shed 25 members of its staff. Advance has hired JPMorgan to assist with the sale, the AP said. That is no easy task.
WIND POWER IPO FILING: First Wind Holdings (WNDY)
We’ve just seen a filing for an initial public offering from First Wind Holdings Inc., which looks actually to be a holding company that owns class A and class B "Units" of First Wind Holdings, LLC. First Wind has applied to take the ticker WNDY on NASDAQ. As per the company name, the company is involved in WIND ENERGY.
Big Activist Stake Send WaMu Soaring (WM)
We are seeing a substantial move in shares of Washington Mutual, Inc. (NYSE: WM). British Activist fund Toscafund Asset Management LLP has disclosed in an SEC Filing that it has accumulated a 6% stake with a position of 105,500,028 shares.
This is being listed as a passive stake in the company. At least that is the case for now.
We’ve seen over 100 million shares trade and shares are up 19% at $5.66 today. Its 52-week trading range is $3.03 to $39.25.
Jon C. Ogg
July 31, 2008
Aventine Renewable Braces For Earnings (AVR)
Aventine Renewable Energy Holdings, Inc (NYSE: AVR) is set to report earnings after today’s close. First Call has estimates pegged at $0.13 EPS on $611.6 million in revenues. If it offers guidance, estimates are $0.04 EPS on $718.4 million in revenues for next quarter and $0.38 EPS on $2.58 Billion in revenues for all of 2008. One interesting note is that despite all of the problems that (potentially) face ethanol analysts are looking for growth in 2009 to $0.47 EPS on $3.83 Billion in revenues.
Hummers and Hindu Cows? (GM, F, TTM)
If we told you General Motors (NYSE: GM) was having troubles and needs to trim bad brands (and more workers), you’d accuse us of working for for the government’s Department of Redundancy Department. But this morning’s reports out of Reuters that Hummer may be sold to Mahindra & Mahindra in India and/or auto makers in Russia and China brings up more thoughts and questions than should even be noted. Sure, the world is flat. But now it is starting to look upside down.
Gold Miners Deliver July Coal for Christmas (ABX, GG)
So much for high gold prices translating to earnings. Barrick Gold Corp. (NYSE:ABX) and Goldcorp Inc. (NYSE:GG) both reported second quarter numbers before market open today, and both reports were on the weak side. Barrick reported net income of $485 million, or EPS of $0.56, up from $336 million and EPS of $0.39 in the same period a year ago. Barrick’s revenue for the quarter was $2.0 billion, below analyst estimates of $2.11 billion. EPS matched analyst estimates.
Q2 GDP: The Recession Without A Recession
Today’s "OFFICIAL" Gross Domestic Product (GDP), or GNP for those of us old school guys, is somehow managing to hang in there. Today’s official Q2 preliminary GDP from the Commerce Department came in at +1.9% versus estimates of about +2.2%. We did see lower revisions for the prior quarters with Q1-2008 final revisions at +0.9% (from +1.0%) and Q4-2007 revised to -0.2% for the first official drop in this cycle. The good news is that we are still the biggest kid on the block as Q2 Real GDP came in at $11.7006 TRILLION. The bad news is that the positives do not reflect the woes affecting the bulk of the population.
Black Gold Drives Exxon (XOM)
Exxon-Mobil (XOM) has proven once again that while the rest of the economy is in rags, big oil mints money. And, that is the way it should be. No one holding shares in the huge energy company has to ask "Where are the shareholders yachts?"
XOM’s second-quarter net income rose 14% to $11.68 billion, or $2.22 a share from $10.26 billion, or $1.83 a share in the year-ago period.
Icahn, ImClone, Bristol-Myers… A 3-Way Marriage (IMCL, BMY)
Another biotech giant is biting the dust via a buyout offer. ImClone Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: IMCL) has been given a buyout offer from Bristol-Myers (NYSE: BMY) at $60.00 per share.
As per the filing:
- James M. Cornelius, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of BMS, called Carl C. Icahn, Chairman of the Board of ImClone, to convey an offer by BMS to enter into an agreement to acquire ImClone for $60 per share in cash (the “BMS Offer”). The BMS Offer represents a premium of approximately 30% over the closing price of ImClone common stock on July 30, 2008, a premium of approximately 40% over the one-month average closing price of ImClone common stock, and a premium in excess of 40% over the three-month and one-year average closing prices of ImClone common stock. The BMS Offer was authorized by the BMS Board of Directors.
Yep, another biotech looks to be disappearing.
Jon C. Ogg
July 31, 2008
Top Pre-Market Analyst Downgrades (AKAM, AVP, CPKI, CBG, FDX, GGP, HOLX, JLL, TIN, THQI, TBL, TROW, USNA)
These are the early bird Downgrades and negative calls from analysts we are seeing this Thursday morning:
- Akamai (AKAM) Cut to Market Perform at FBR.
- Avon (AVP) Cut to Hold at Deutsche Bank.
- California Pizza Kitchen (CPKI) Cut to Neutral at Baird.
- CB Richard Ellis (CBG) Cut to Neutral at JPMorgan.
- FedEx (FDX) Cut to Equal Weight at Morgan Stanley.
- General Growth Properties (GGP) Cut to Sell at Citigroup.
- Hologic (HOLX) Cut to Hold at Jefferies.
- Jones Lang LaSalle (JLL) Cut to Neutral at JPMorgan.
- Temple-Inland (TIN) Cut to Neutral at Credit Suisse.
- THQ (THQI) Cut to Perform at Oppenheimer.
- Timberland (TBL) Cut to Sell at Citigroup.
- T.Rowe Price (TROW) Cut to Market Perform at Wachovia.
- USANA (USNA) Cut to Underperform at Jefferies.
Jon C. Ogg
July 31, 2008
GM (GM) Turns From Downsizing To Panic
GM (GM) has developed the pattern of matching bad news with more bad news. Since the company does still have some bright spots, it may want to balance its public relations act. Its relentlessly negative take on its own prospects has begun to drive all confidence in the company out of the markets.
The largest car company in the US has announced that it will put 5,000 more poor souls out on the streets. These are white-collar workers and The Wall Street Journal estimates that is about 15% of GM’s salaried work force in North America.
Deutsche Bank (DB) Follows Merrill Lynch (MER) To Signal Crisis Redux
"You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time."–Abraham Lincoln
Deutsche Bank (DB) surprised its shareholders and the financial world with a hefty $3.6 billion in writes-offs for the last quarter.
According to Reuters, "Deutsche listed its latest injuries from the global crisis, saying it made 1 billion euros of writedowns in residential mortgage-backed securities and a further 500 million euros linked to monoline insurers which insure against bond defaults."
Starbucks (SBUX) Chases The Economy Towards Its Bottom
Starbucks (SBUX) posted its first loss as a public company but gave investors something to hang on to. It reaffirmed that it will do better in fiscal 2009. To do that the company has to assume that a series of expense cuts coupled with better sales will cause a rebound in earnings.
Not likely.
T. Boone Pickens For President
T. Boone Pickens is a Whirling Dervish of a man. At 84, he spins from Congressional appearances to CNN and then stages his own town hall meetings on alternative energy.
Pickens now makes more appearances than either of the presidential candidates. His are for alternative energy policy, and he means to get out the vote.
Hasbro (HAS) Would Be Nuts Not To Fight “Scrabulous”
Hasbro Inc. (HAS) is getting quite a bit of flack from every corner of the Internet for waging a legal battle against the popular Facebook knock-off of Scrabble called "Scrabulous." Much of the criticism is dead wrong.
Media Digest 7/31/2008 Reuters, WSJ, NYTimes, FT, Bloomberg
According to Reuters, T Boone Pickens is seeking an "army" of business leaders and citizens to back alternative energy.
Reuters reports that Starbucks (SBUX) posted if first loss as a public company but back its forecast for the next fiscal.
Asia Market 7/31/2008 (NTT)(CN)(SNP)
Markets in Asia were mixed.
The Nikkei was up .1% to 13,377. NEC was up 2.4% to 593. NTT (NTT) was up 4% to 553000.
The Hang Seng was up .3% to 22,764. China Netcom (CN) was up 1.9.% to 24.00. China Petroleum (SNP) was down 2.1% to 8.12.
The Shanghai Composite fell 1.6% to 2,791.
Data from Reuters.
Douglas A. McIntyre
-
Today’s top tickerspy Indexes Chinese Solar Sto... +9.0% Solar Stocks +5.5% Pollution Control... +4.7% Ethanol and Biofu... +4.2% Chinese IT Stocks +4.1% 
-
-
-
- paidContent - Video: U.S. Chief Geek Aneesh Chopra On Broadband, Net Neutrality And Content
- paidContent - Boo.com Owner's Sale Revives DotCom Nostalgia
- paidContent - Google Submits Revised Books Settlement Minutes Before Deadline
- paidContent - Dow Jones Reaches Out To McKinsey—Company Says It's Building, Not Cutting
- paidContent - Inside Word: How To Crack Down On 'Scammy' Offers In The Virtual World
- paidContent - paidContent Quick Hits 11.13.09
-
©2009 24/7 Wall St.
Powered by WordPress.com VIP
Designed by SlipFire
