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Market So Bad, Even Ex-Spitzer Target Stocks Close Much Lower (NYSE, AIG, JNS, MMC, MER)

247wallst — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 15:22:25 +0000

By now you have heard news of New York Governor Eliot Spitzer’s involvement in a prostitution ring. So much for crime and ethics fighters being immune from temptation. But what we wanted to see was if this helped some of the old Eliot Spitzer target company, and shockingly this news did not even help these companies close in positive territory or even lend much aid from a bear bite.

Our apologies for not being able to include the full list because it was much more extensive than this. Below is how these major former target companies closed, and they all closed down with a weak market:

NYSE Euronext (NYSE: NYX) wasn’t a target itself, but Dick Grasso was over the pay package. Shares closed down some 5% at $57.40, a new 52-week low and under the old $59.40 to $101.00 trading range.
American International Group (NYSE: AIG) just probably saw the odds of an increased quasi-return of Hank Greenberg, who has already expressed an interest in getting back in. AIG shares closed down over 2% at $41.95, also under the 52-week trading range of $42.14 to $72.97.
Marsh & McLennan (NYSE: MMC) fell under the insurance rebating issues, and it has never really recovered. Marsh-Mac shares closed down 1.75% at $24.66, although that is not a 52-week low.
Janus (NYSE: JNS) was part of the market timing scandal brought on by Spitzer. Shares closed down 1% at $21.88, also not a 52-week low.
Merrill Lynch (NYSE: MER) was part of the Wall Street research settlement, although that was a much larger group of companies than many other industry complaints. Merrill Lynch shares closed down 5% at $42.84, under its 52-week trading range of $44.30 to $95.00.

Spitzer was not a great loved brother on Wall Street despite his actions cleaning up many business practices in various industries. A better market or a decent day may have helped these stocks close higher. This is just more reminder that we are in a bear market.
Jon C. Ogg
March 10, 2008

NYSE Buys AMEX, Becomes ETF King (NYX)

247wallst — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 16:54:54 +0000

The NYSE Euronext (NYSE: NYX) is finally acquiring the American Stock Exchange. NYSE is paying roughly $260 million entirely in NYSE stock to acquire its tiny rival exchange. Amex members (full seat owners) will be entitled to receive additional shares of NYSE Euronext common stock based on the net proceeds from the expected sale of Amex’s lower Manhattan headquarters.

There are several things that will happen as a key here:

The NYSE will now be the true leader in Exchange Traded Funds (ETF’s) trading, which will bring over massive amounts of more trading on the exchange. Amex has some 381 ETF’s (compared to 240 NYSE ARCA ETF’s). Now we know who the ETF KING IS.
This will also bring over numerous closed-end funds and structured product listings to NYSE; Amex had 545 listings.
The NYSE will also sell the American Stock Exchange building and will consolidate the operations.

The NYSE will now be a leader in stock options trading. The combined entity will see an annualized cost synergies of over $100 million within two years from closing when you include technology, data center and staff integration, consolidation of professional and contract services and vendors.

We had been waiting and waiting for AMEX to come public, but that won’t be happening now. The rumors on this were circling last week and these terms are within the range that had been discussed.

Jon C. Ogg
January 17, 2008

September Short Interest Decreases At NYSE & AMEX (NYX, NDAQ)

247wallst — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 18:20:47 +0000

The short interest data for the NYSE Euronext (NYSE:NYX) and the American Stock Exchange are both out and they are both showing something we haven’t seen for some time: short interest declined, if you can believe it. For months this was a growing number as the market was rising.

The NYSE Group showed short interest on the September 14 settlement date listed as 11,841,051,529 shares, down from 12,466,511,521 as of August 15, 2007. This is the first drop from when January 2007 short interest of 9.68 Billion shares fell to 9.595 Billion shares in February 2007.

Over at the AMEX, there was also a drop in the total short interest. August 15, 2007 showed 1,194,902,117 shares in the total short interest, yet today’s numbers shows 1,032,872,816 shares as of the September 14, 2007 settlement date. The last drop seen on AMEX short interest was listed when the 877,477,463 shares short in March 2007 fell to 865,833,907 in April 2007.

It appears that maybe short sellers figured it out this time and decided that being short stocks going into a rate cutting cycle wasn’t a good play. The short interest report for NASDAQ (NASDAQ:NDAQ) will not be out until next week, so stay tuned. Throughout the night or tomorrow we’ll have some individual short interest data.

Jon C. Ogg
September 20, 2007

Will Saber Rattling Kill NASDAQ/OMX/LSE/Dubai Deal? (NDAQ, NYX, C)

247wallst — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 17:55:00 +0000

The NASDAQ Stock Market (NASDAQ:NDAQ) has been in a long hunt over how it plans to grow and compete in a new world of mega-exchanges, and frankly its second place status in the U.S. for stocks is one that it would acknowledge is far from that of the NYSE Euronext (NYSE:NYX). It was unsuccessful in its buyout of the London Stock Exchange. Then it focused on the Nordic OMX, only to get a rival bid over OMX from Borse Dubai. The NASDAQ finally reached a deal that can be secured, but the much needed help that arrived may have been slapped in the face by observers.

The NASDAQ yesterday reached a mutual deal with Borse Dubai that will allow it to gain control of the OMX. In exchange, NASDAQ is giving up most of its holding (appears to be a 28% stake of 31.5%) in the London Stock Exchange. But NASDAQ is also kicking in a 20% stake of its own stock. The NASDAQ purchase price would be equivalent to about $41.00 per per share, and it appears this is for only a 5% voting stake with an ‘independent trustee’ holding the rest. NASDAQ will also get a stake in Borse Dubai, but we are going to stop there. because this is starting to sound like a monopoly game where the second and third tier players gang up on the likely winner.

There are just two problems: the Qatar Investment Authority has steppedin to potentially give a higher bid for the OMX with a 9.98% stake androughly a 20% of the LSE. The bigger problem is that Senate BankingCommittee Chairman Christopher Dodd (D-Conn.) is out saying thisrequires close review, and Senator Schumer is saying it raises seriousquestions about allowing foreign governments to acquire U.S. financialexchanges. Hopefully this is just political jawboning and saberrattling.

Many in the markets have the feeling that uncheckedand fettered capitalism is the best path to prosperity. That may betrue and it might not, but some sense has to be put into the equationon both sides. If workers are competing against child and slave labor,that isn’t fair; but conversely if governments will not even allowstakes to be held in companies then the pendulum is going to far thatway too.

This is not the Dubai Ports deal, which was a highlypoliticized event. This is a small stake with limited voting rightsand influence, and to top it off in case the insulated boys in D.C.didn’t realize it then they should look closely: NASDAQ NEEDS HELP, BIGTIME. The boys in D. C. didn’t exactly go out and claim how the NYSEacquisition of Euronext to become NYSE Euronext (NYSE:NYX) might beunfair to the Europeans, and that was for all practical purposes acomplete power shift and total buyout.

The single largestshareholder in the mega-giant bank Citigroup (NYSE:C) is Al-Waleed binTalal, and that wasn’t a horrific scare when they needed it. Trying tocalculate how many US-workers (not including the private securityworkers) and the tens (or hundreds?) of billions of dollars that we getannually in Middle-Eastern infrastructure construction and maintenancecontracts is beyond our own databases. It’s also beyond that of the U.S. Labor Department because if you see the calculations they make you know they are using a single abacus that always double-counts in favor of the house.

Some protectionism andsome regulation is actually OK for everyone, because if everyone is uncheckedand has no rules then there will be a bad end. But total protectionism(particularly over certain stakes) is almost equally as bad and will ultimately becounter-productive. If the D.C. regulators would accept the state ofthe world for what it is and go ask NASDAQ if this is what it needs,they will hear a resounding "YESSSSS!" back on the phone.

NASDAQclosed up only 1.35% today at $36.51, well short of the $41.00+ termswith Dubai for a small stake and well under the $38.00+ opening pricesbefore the saber rattling started.

Jon C. Ogg
September 20, 2007