The OECD expresses concerns that Europe could slip into a deep recession. (Reuters)

The EU debt crisis pushes global shares lower. (Reuters)

Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) cuts its Facebook (NASDAQ: FB) ratings just before the IPO. (Reuters)

Sony (NYSE: SNE) and Samsung try to get retailers to discount their TVs less. (WSJ)

AOL’s (NYSE: AOL) Patch local website project continues to draw the ire of investors. (WSJ)

The Congressional Budget Office says that gridlock in DC could cause a recession in 2013. (WSJ)

SAP (NYSE: SAP) will buy Ariba (NASDAQ: ARBA) for $4.3 billion. (WSJ)

South Korea will continue to import oil from Iran despite U.S. and EU sanctions over the Iran weapon’s program. (WSJ)

The International Monetary Fund says the UK needs to create stimulus programs. (WSJ)

Dell’s (NASDAQ: DELL) earnings are hurt as it attempts to move beyond PCs as its major line of sales. (WSJ)

Ford’s (NYSE: F) credit rating is upgraded from “junk” status. (WSJ)

CalSTRS, the second-largest U.S. public pension fund, will vote against Walmart (NYSE: WMT) directors in the wake of a bribery scandal. (FT)

EU banks would be damaged if Greece leaves the eurozone, as they have almost $1.2 trillion in debt from Spain, Portugal, Italy and Ireland. (FT)

Mazda and Fiat to build a sports car. (Bloomberg)

Douglas A. McIntyre

The companies announced that SAP America has entered into an agreement to acquire Ariba for its cloud-based business commerce network at a price of $45.00 per share.  This generates and enterprise value (equity and debt) of about $4.3 billion.  The Ariba board of directors has already approved the transaction unanimously and the buyout represents a 20% premium over the May 21 closing price.

Today’s acquisition will combine Ariba’s buyer-seller collaboration network with SAP’s customer base and business process expertise “to create new models for business-to-business collaboration in the cloud.”

SAP is worth almost $70 billion in market value and its $58.77 share price for ADRs compares to a 52-week range of $47.39 to $72.52. Ariba shares were up 0.8% at $37.96 before being halted and the 52-week range is $21.90 to $40.45. With Thomson Reuters having a consensus estimate of $0.99 EPS for 2012, SAP is effectively paying 45-times earnings for Ariba.

JON C. OGG

Read The Most Powerful CEOs in America

Read The Least Powerful CEOs in America

The most powerful CEOs fall into three categories. The first are founders who are currently CEOs. They may, by themselves, or with other founders, have voting control over their companies. Larry Page of Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) is the best example of this. He started the Internet search engine with Sergey Brin. Together with Google’s chairman Eric Schmidt, who they hired, the three hold shares that have nearly two-thirds of the company’s voting rights.

The next category is founders who no longer have the majority of the vote in their companies, but who have been in charge successfully for so long that their job security is not in question. Jeff Bezos at Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN) is the best example of this group. He owns slightly less than 20% of the company that he started in 1994. This stake is greater than that of any other shareholder. But it is his status as founder and his tremendous success that ensure he will not be replaced unless he wishes to be.

The final category of powerful CEOs are relatives of founders. These CEOs inherited the voting rights, usually from their parents, and they use those rights to run the company for another generation. The best example of this is Brian Roberts of Comcast (NASDAQ: CMCSA), whose father started the company. By almost any measure, Comcast has done well financially and in the stock market. Even if it did not, Roberts would have his job.

24/7 Wall St. reviewed the corporate structure, governance and voting rights of the 500 largest companies by market cap. Based on a review of company proxies, we identified those companies where the CEO had voting control of the company or was the company’s founder. We then limited the universe to those companies with market cap in excess of $30 billion.

These are 24/7 Wall St.’s most powerful CEOs in America.

ABB Ltd. (NYSE: ABB) Cut to Neutral at JPMorgan.

Air Products & Chemicals Inc. (NYSE: APD) Raised to Equal-weight at Morgan Stanley.

Akamai Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: AKAM) Raised to Buy on weakness at UBS.

ConcoPhillips (NYSE: COP) Raised to Neutral at Macquarie.

General Dynamics Corp. (NYSE: GD) Cut to Equal-weight at Morgan Stanley.

Harley-Davidson, Inc. (NYSE: HOG) Raised to Overweight at Barclays.

Hess Corporation (NYSE: HES) Cut to Neutral at JPMorgan; Cut to Equal-weight at Barclays; Cut to Neutral at Credit Suisse.

Infosys Ltd. (NASDAQ: INFY) Raised to Buy at Citigroup.

ManpowerGroup (NYSE: MAN) named Bull of the Day at Zacks.

Marriott International (NYSE: MAR) Raised to Buy at Argus.

SAP AG (NYSE: SAP) Cut to Market Perform at Wells Fargo.

Sprint Nextel Corporation (NYSE: S) maintained Hold at Argus.

The Travelers Companies, Inc. (NYSE: TRV) Raised to Hold at Deutsche Bank.

Watson Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NYSE: WPI) Raised to Buy at Citigroup.

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JON C. OGG

American International Group Inc. (NYSE: AIG) Raised to Outperform at William Blair.

Bankrate, Inc. (NYSE: RATE) Started as Buy at SunTrust Robinson Humphrey.

Comerica Inc. (NYSE: CMA) Cut to Market Perform at BMO.

CNOOC Ltd. (NYSE: CEO) Raised to Hold at Jefferies.

Cree Inc. (NASDAQ: CREE) Cut to Hold at ThinkEquity.

Deckers Outdoor Corporation (NASDAQ: DECK) Raised to Neutral at Stern Agee.

First Solar, Inc. (NASDAQ: FSLR) Raised to Hold at Cantor Fitzgerald; Cut to Sell at Wunderlich; Maintained as Buy but cut target $40 from $50 at Argus.

Intel Corporation (NASDAQ: INTC) Maintained Outperform with $35 target and raised 2013 estimates at Credit Suisse.

International Business Machines Corporation (NYSE: IBM) Cut to Neutral at Macquarie; Raised estimates but maintained as Neutral at Credit Suisse.

SAP AG (NYSE: SAP) Reiterated Buy with $84 target at Argus.

T. Rowe Price Group (NASDAQ: TROW) named as Bull of the Day at Zacks.

Tata Motors Ltd. (NYSE: TTM) maintained as the most undervalued stock on the price-to-book versus return on equity valuation model at Credit Suisse.

United Continental Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: UAL) named as Bear of the Day at Zacks.

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JON C. OGG

Achillion Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ: ACHN) Started as Outperform with $11 target at Credit Suisse.

Apple  Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) Started as Strong Buy with $800 target at Raymond James (late Monday call).

Boston Scientific Corp. (NYSE: BSX) Reiterated Outperform with $7 target at Credit Suisse.

Celestica Inc. (NYSE: CLS) Cut to Hold at Deutsche Bank.

Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C) Reiterated Outperform with $48 target at Credit Suisse.

Citi Trends, Inc. (NASDAQ: CTRN) named Bear of the Day at Zacks.

First Solar, Inc. (NASDAQ: FSLR) Cut to Hold at Goldman Sachs.

Hain Celestial Group (NASDAQ: HAIN) named Bull of the Day at Zacks.

Idenix Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ: IDIX) Started as Neutral at Credit Suisse.

Infosys Ltd. (NASDAQ: INFY) Cut to Neutral at Goldman Sachs.

Newcastle Investment Corporation (NYSE: NCT) Started as Outperform at Keefe Bruyette & Woods.

SAP AG (NYSE: SAP) Raised to Buy at SocGen; Cut to Neutral at HSBC.

Teekay Tankers Ltd. (NYSE: TNK) Raised to Neutral with new $5.20 target at BofA/ML.

Tiffany & Co. (NYSE: TIF) Started as Neutral at Macquarie.

Valero Energy Corporation (NYSE: VLO) Reiterated Outperform with $37 target at Credit Suisse.

Vertex Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ: VRTX) Started as Outperform with $43 target at Credit Suisse.

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JON C. OGG

American Superconductor Corporation (NASDAQ: AMSC) Started as Buy at Maxim Group.

Cepheid, Inc. (NASDAQ: CPHD) named Bull of the Day at Zacks.

Eldorado Gold Corporation (NYSE: EGO) Raised to Buy at Canaccord Genuity.

GameStop Corporation (NYSE: GME) Cut to Hold at Needham.

Huntington Bancshares (NASDAQ: HBAN) Started as Neutral at Goldman Sachs.

J. C. Penney Company, Inc. (NYSE: JCP) Started as Neutral at UBS.

Macy’s, Inc. (NYSE: M) Started as Neutral at UBS.

NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ: NVDA) Started as Outperform at RBC.

Polycom Inc. (NASDAQ: PLCM) Cut estimates but maintained Buy at Argus.

SAP AG (NYSE: SAP) Cut to Hold at ThinkEquity.

SuperValu Inc. (NYSE: SVU) maintained Neutral but cut target to $6 at Credit Suisse.

United Continental (NYSE: UAL) named as Bear of the Day at Zacks.

Yelp Inc. (NYSE: YELP) Started as Neutral at Goldman Sachs; Started as Neutral at Citigroup; Started as Perform at Oppenheimer; Started as Hold at Jefferies.

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U.S. brokerage firms pay increasingly higher bonuses to get top producers. (Reuters)

Alcoa (NYSE: AA) has a surprising first-quarter profit. (Reuters)

Travelzoo (NASDAQ: TZOO) may put itself up for sale. (Reuters)

The Department of Justice will sue Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) over the way it helps price e-books. (Reuters)

Shareholder Starboard tells AOL (NYSE: AOL) that it will continue its proxy fight despite the company’s sale of patents. (Reuters)

Carlyle will try to get an $8 billion valuation as it goes public. (Reuters)

Best Buy’s (NYSE: BBY) CEO resigns because of a board investigation into his “personal conduct.” (WSJ)

Fears of financial problems in Spain push down global markets. (WSJ)

Retailers cannot stop buyers from looking at merchandise in stores and then buying online. (WSJ)

SAP (NYSE: SAP) makes a large investment in its efforts to compete with Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL). (WSJ)

American International Group (NYSE: AIG) will return to the property investing business. (WSJ)

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac could save $1.7 billion by writing down some loan balances, according to a regulator. (WSJ)

The Institute of Medicine suggests a new tax on medical care. (WSJ)

The National Federation of Independent Business says small businesses are less optimistic because of energy costs. (WSJ)

Officials in India express concerns about energy prices. (WSJ)

The International Monetary Fund will cut its forecasts of China’s current account surplus. (WSJ)

CareerCast says the most desired job last year was software engineer. (WSJ)

China’s oil imports reached 5.55 million barrels a day in March, up 8.7% from last year, according to the China’s General Administration of Customs. (WSJ)

The Federal Reserve may change the way it stress tests large banks. (WSJ)

The falling prices of real estate likely will hurt Chinese property investment firms. (WSJ)

Some economists believe that subsidies for U.S. service firms to do business overseas could sharply improve sales. (NYT)

Gross domestic product may improve, with wholesale inventories as a sign. (NYT)

U.S. states that have tried to change retirement benefits begin to face court actions. (FT)

Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy says his nation’s future may ride on its ability to bring down bond yields as it presents austerity plans. (Bloomberg)

The Journal of the American Medical Association says auto crashes rise before Tax Day. (Bloomberg)

Douglas A. McIntyre

Microsoft’s most recent quarterly report shows how much Windows 7 has aged. Sales from the Servers & Tools, Business and Entertainment Devices divisions surged. Sales from the Windows division fell from $5 billion to $4.7 billion. Operating income fell from $3.1 billion to $2.8 billion for the same quarter compared to last year’s. The margins for the Windows division are wildly high compared to most other widely distributed software products, but they do not match those of the periods immediately after the launch of Windows 7.

As Microsoft looks forward, its Entertainment division is unlikely to produce much in the way of profits, at least compared to other segments of the company. It made only $530 million last quarter. Online operations, which includes search, lost $455 million, in essence offsetting any gains in the Entertainment operation, which is driven mostly by Xbox sales.

Microsoft’s Business and Servers & Tools operations increasingly are under siege by Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL), SAP (NYSE: SAP) and other large companies that want to take enterprise software from Microsoft. As these enterprise software products move to the cloud, Microsoft’s margins on them could shrink.

The risk that Windows 8 faces as it launches is that much of PC computing has moved to the cloud as well. And other PC-like activities already have begun a migration to portable devices such as smartphones, a sector in which Microsoft has been bested by Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) and Google’s (NASDAQ: GOOG) Android mobile OS. But a huge portion of the hundreds of millions of PCs around the world still will upgrade to Windows 8, as their owners have upgraded to earlier versions of Windows. The product remains the backbone of PC productivity and entertainment activity.

Windows 8 may be the final generation of the product that has tremendous sales. By the time Windows 9 launches, a very many PC and portable devices will run on the cloud. And PCs may have been largely replaced by tablets and smartphones, most of which run non-Microsoft operating systems.

Microsoft can still take advantage of the final years of the PC age. Ballmer may get his stock price improvement yet.

Douglas A. McIntyre

A large rise in iPad sales helps drive Apple’s (NASDAQ: AAPL) shares to new highs. (Reuters)

The SEC and Citigroup (NYSE: C) may win an appeal of their fraud settlement case. (Reuters)

The S&P 500 rises above 1,400 for the first time since the credit crisis. (Reuters)

Geithner says the economy is improving but oil prices are worrisome. (Reuters)

Facebook calls in bankers for a pre-IPO briefing. (Reuters)

SAP (NYSE: SAP) to move into the database software business. (Reuters)

Major components of the new iPad were made by Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM) and Samsung. (Reuters)

Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) and other banks may buy AIG’s (NYSE: AIG) toxic assets. (WSJ)

The U.S. and EU will examine Google’s (NASDAQ: GOOG) move to bypass privacy settings in the Apple Safari browser. (WSJ)

AMR is concerned that as it stays in Chapter 11 it may be taken over or broken up. (WSJ)

Chevron (NYSE: CVX) says oil is leaking in a well off Brazil. (WSJ)

A large boom in shale gas cuts back U.S. plans for more nuclear reactors. (WSJ)

Ford (NYSE: F) extends a $9 billion credit line until 2012. (WSJ)

Sprint Nextel (NYSE: S) to end its partnership with troubled LightSquared. (WSJ)

The CFTC will increase its monitoring of rapid trades. (NYT)

Analysts raise price targets for Apple because of iPad sales. (FT)

Italy pays Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) $3.4 billion to exit a bet on the nation’s interest rates. (Bloomberg)

Moody’s cuts Nomura to its lowest rating grade. (Bloomberg)

Douglas A. McIntyre