The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety came out with its annual list of safest cars. Ford (NYSE:F) and its Volvo unit got six awards, VW and Subaru each got five.
Chrysler had four cars on the list and Honda (NYSE:HMC) and GM each had two
Toyota (NYSE:TM), BMW, Mazda Motor and Mitsubishi ended up with nothing. Read More
Reuters: China is the key stop on Obama’s tour of Asia.
Reuters: South Korea’s businesses may start to feel more pressure from China competitors..
Reuters: Hewlett-Packard (NYSE:HPQ) bought 3Com (NYSE:COM) for $3.1 billion.
Reuters: Lou Dobbs left CNN (NYSE:TWX) Read More
Short sellers have bought into the notion that the financial industry is in full recovery.
Shares sold short in Wells Fargo (NYSE:WFC) fell 8% to 78.8 million shares. Shares short in CIT (NYSE:CIT) were off 4% to 78.1 million. The short interest in Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) dropped 12% to 67 million. The short interest in JPMorgan (NYSE:JPM) dropped 4% to 37.7 million. Read More
By Douglas A. McIntyre
The S&P 500 index is so far having a fine year, up a bit more than 20%. But several big-company stocks in the index have doubled, or better, over that time. Among the best-performers are some of America’s most well-known companies.
Here’s a look at 10 of those and their prospects of advancing further — or sliding back into the large pack of equities that have had only modest advances during the current bull market (all prices are as of the close on Nov. 9).
Ford (NYSE:F) was left for dead when it traded at $1 last November. The market thought it would share the sorry fate of its rivals General Motors and Chrysler, and that common shareholders would get nothing.
GM executive Bob Lutz, who has been a senior executive in the car industry longer than any man alive, will become the new chairman of Opel. GM has decided to keep ownership of Opel and British car company Vauxhall after months of negotiations to sell them.
Lutz told Swiss Sonntag newspaper that he is likely to stick with earlier plans to cut overall costs at Opel by 30%. That will probably mean that 10,000 of Opel’s 50,000 workers will be fired. Read More
Almost no one expected any of the world’s largest car companies to make money this year. Sales around the globe are simply down too much and efforts to cut costs have not been enough to match the drop-off in revenue.
Ford (NYSE:F) shocked Wall St. by making almost $1 billion in the third quarter. Even more of a surprise, it made money in its flagging North American operations.
A second surprise profit was posted today, by the world’s largest car company, Toyota (NYSE:TM) Read More
China has approved a plan for Disney (NYSE:DIS) to build a theme part in Shanghai. The American entertainment company has been trying to get a go ahead to build the $4 billion project for several years. The Chinese government gave no reason for the timing of its announcement. Shortly after the news became public, Chinese residents began to attack plans to build the park. The Wall Street Journal reports that, based on online polls and comments “Walt Disney won’t make Shanghai the happiest place in the world.”
Disney joins a long list of companies from Dell (NASDAQ:DELL) to Wal-Mart (NYSE:WMT) to McDonald’s (NYSE:MCD) and Ford (NYSE:F) which are willing to bet that the Chinese consumer will eventually become a critical part of the expansion of the economy in the world’s most populous country. China’s GDP has been driven by exports. The US, where most consumer-focused firms have made their profits over the years, has counted on those consumers to be the engine of its economic expansion. Read More
GM’s sales rose unexpectedly, by 4% in October to 177,603 cars and light trucks. Chevrolet retail sales were especially strong, up 31%. The No.1 US car company said fourth quarter production would be 17% above the third quarter of the year.
GM’s news follows positive news from Ford (NYSE:F) which had a sales increase of almost 3% in October to 132,483. Sales of the third market leader, Toyota (NYSE:TM) were flat at 152,165.
Chrysler’s sales were down, as expected, falling 30% to 65,803.
Taken as a whole, the October data indicates that US car sales have bottomed and that the rest of the quarter may be stronger than expected.
Douglas A. McIntyre
Jerome York is a nasty piece of work and a financial genius who has been successful as a lieutenant to billionaire raider Kirk Kerkorian. York’s curriculum vita as a financial analyst is impeccable. He has been CFO of Chrysler and IBM (NYSE:GM) and a board member of GM, when it still had a real board, and Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL)
York was at the center of Kerkorian’s efforts to sell-off Chrysler and GM, or at least get new managements for them both. He knows the global auto industry as well as anyone in the world who does not work in it full time, and probably better than most of those who do. Read More
Reuters: The value of the yuan could cause a trade war between the US and China.
Reuters: Executive pensions rose despite drops in stock prices.
Reuters: Lloyds will make a large stock offering.
Reuters: Stanley Works (NYSE:SWK) bought Black & Decker (NYSE:BDK) for $3.46 billion.
Reuters: CIT’s (NYSE:CIT) exit from bankruptcy is not clear.
Reuters: UBS (NYSE:UBS) posted a loss and wealth management clients continued to leave.
Reuters: Ford (NYSE:F) posted a surprise profit.
Reuters: Manufacturing and pending home sales both rose.
Reuters: Volker said the economy could not rely on consumer spending.
Reuters: The commercial real estate business is still in deep trouble.
WSJ: Toyota (NYSE:TM) expects a monthly sales decline.
WSJ: IllyCaffè SpA will work with local coffee shops to compete with Starbucks (NASDAQ:SBUX).
WSJ: The head of the IMF says financial firms are going back to old practices.
WSJ: Blu-ray makers are becoming more involved with web video.
WSJ: Research-in-Motion (NASDAQ:RIMM) is the focus of a number of bearish comments.
WSJ: Schwab (NASDAQ:SCHW) is making a push into ETFs.
WSJ: GM’s board will revisit the Opel sale.
WSJ: Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) Office faces inexpensive versions of similar software.
WSJ: Sears (NASDAQ:SHLD) may need to get cash from its Canadian operation which presents challenges.
WSJ: Problems are beginning to appear in the financials of Chinese banks.
WSJ: Business bankruptcies rose 7% in October.
NYT: The US will allow GM to use federal money to put into Delphi.
NYT: The Supreme Court is looking at fees advisors charge mutual funds.
NYT: The Senate is pushing insurance companies on the amount of premiums they actually spend on care.
NYT: Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) may buy tax credits from Fannie Mae (NYSE:FNM)
FT: The Fed has asked banks to adopt it new pay rules early to cover 2009 compensation.
FT: Ebay’s (NASDAQ:EBAY) PayPal has opened doors to outside developers.
Bloomberg: The next head of Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) may be based in NYC.
Douglas A. McIntyre
This is a strange morning for day trader alerts. There are not dozens and dozens of stocks in the big news, but those that are moving are moving big. We have links through on each stock over at VSInvestor.com for more data and analysis on price and volume:
CIT Group Inc. (NYSE: CIT) is actually very thin volume as no NYSE trades are seen, but it is down by almost half on its bankruptcy filing.
Dendreon Corp. (NASDAQ: DNDN) is trading over 5% higher after filing for PROVENGE approval with the FDA.
Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) is trading up about 7% this morning on high volume. It actually made money.
Human Genome Sciences, Inc. (NASDAQ: HGSI) is trading up over 30% at multi-year highs on its positive lupus study data at the higher dose.
Motorola Inc. (NYSE: MOT) is running rather well today. The troubled phone and communications maker is up about 5% on an analyst upgrade and on a report in Barron’s.
You can join our open email distribution list to get updates on top analyst upgrades and downgrades, top day trader alerts, IPO’s, secondary offerings, Warren Buffett and other guru activity, M&A and more.
JON C. OGG
The UAW rank-and-file may have given Ford a little fit over the weekend by voting down a contract with the No.2 US car company.
Monday dawned a better day as Ford may the surprise announcement that it made $1 billion in the third quarter. The firm reported net income of $997 million, or $.28 per share, an improvement of $1.2 billion from the third quarter of 2008. Pre-tax operating profit totaled $1.1 billion, an improvement of $3.9 billion from a year ago. It was Ford’s first pre-tax operating profit since the first quarter of 2008. Read More
Reuters: Investors in the banking sector were disturbed by the CIT (NYSE:CIT) bankruptcy.
Reuters: Summers will lead a high level meeting on the economy.
Reuters: US companies are holding more cash.
Reuters: The Fed is likely to keep interest rates flat due to economic uncertainty. Read More
The UAW rank-and-file rejected a labor pact with Ford (NYSE:F) even though the car company offered each member of the union $1,000 to agree to the deal The No.2 US auto company now has to deal with the bitter fruit of its own prosperity. Ford has done much better financially than its government-supported rivals GM and Chrysler over the last year and has probably picked up market share on every major car company, foreign or domestic, that has a major presence in the American market. Read More
Earnings season may be winding down, but next week still has some very important companies that are economic indicators in and of themselves or are key stocks that have broad customer and investor bases. Picking only ten companies leaves many key stocks out, but we have some here which will appeal to most investors and traders. Among next week’s top earnings are Chesapeake Energy Corporation (NYSE: CHK), Ford Motor Company (NYSE: F), Kraft Foods Inc. (NYSE: KFT), MasterCard Incorporated (NYSE: MA), Cisco Systems Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO), Comcast Corporation (NASDAQ: CMCSA), QUALCOMM Inc. (NASDAQ: QCOM), and Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (NYSE: BRK-A) (NYSE: BRK-B).
We also have the biggest cult stocks of all with SIRIUS Satellite Radio (NASDAQ: SIRI) and Vonage Holdings Corp. (NYSE: VG) reporting next week. We have offered some color on each stock along with chart data where relevant, along with Thomson Reuters consensus estimates.
Read More
Reuters: House Democrats unveiled their healthcare bill.
Reuters: Senators may extend home purchase credits until April.
Reuters: China will launch a case against The Big Three auto companies.
Reuters: Galleon paid Wall St. bankers millions to give data that would allow a trading “edge.” Read More
Consumer Reports came out with its annual new car reliability survey. The study is widely anticipated because it pre=”it “>is based on the opinions of 1.4 million people and because the Consumers Union is considered unbiased in its work of evaluating goods and services for the American public. It is also one of the most well-known non-profit organizations in the US. Read More
Reuters: The Nielsen survey shows consumer confidence up in the US for the first time since 2007.
Reuters: Obama’s financial reforms are advancing in Congress.
Reuters: The pay czar said his authority should not be expanded.
Reuters: Obama’s “too big to fail” bill would curb bailouts. Read More
Reuters: Corporate directors are on the hot seat over management pay.
Reuters: The US healthcare system wastes up to $800 billion a year.
Reuters: Capmark Financial filed for bankrupcy.
Reuters: The land dealer advisor resigned from Calpers. Read More
When GM decided to close its Saturn and Pontiac brands it forgot to put a “do not resuscitate” sign on Cadillac.
Cadillac is in trouble, and that trouble is likely to get much worse in 2010 due to a poor product mix, a leasing system that puts it at a huge disadvantage to its competition, and an ongoing perception that many of its models are not as well-made as their Japanese and European counterparts. Read More
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