Asia Markets 12/25/2007
Most markets in Asia were closed. The Nikkei was up 1.9% to 15,553. Hitachi (HIT) rose 3.9% to 836. Sony (SNE) rose 4.1% to 6360. The Shanghai Composite fell .6% to 5,201. Data from…
All Work
Douglas A. McIntyre
Apple (AAPL) Hits All-Time High Ahead Of Holiday
Only good news for Apple (AAPL). At least that is how Wall St. looks at the holiday prospects for the maker of Macs, iPods, and iPhones. Apple’s shares hit $199.33, an all-time high, up…
Merrill Lynch Financing Deemed as Too Large of Discount (MER, GE)
Merrill Lynch (NYSE: MER) raised some $6.2 Billion today, or at least up to that amount, and that is not inclusive of the unit sale to General Electric (NYSE:GE). The breakdown is for up…
Och-Ziff Analyst Quiet Period Ends (OZM)
Hedge find manager Och-Ziff Capital Management Group LLC (NYSE:OZM) has had an interesting post-IPO trading. It priced at $32.00, but units in the hedge fund manager have traded as far down as under $22.00…
Thai Elections, Thai Funds (TTF, TF)
When your own markets are quiet ahead of a Christmas holiday, it’s frequent that investors turn to look at news in overseas markets for impacting events. This weekend there was an election in Thailand,…
MTC Technologies White Christmas Buyout (MTCT)
This morning, MTC Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: MTCT) has confirmed its buyout news from late Friday night where MTC Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: MTCT) has signed a definitive merger agreement to be acquired by BAE Systems,…
Is Search Engine Traffic Starting To Decline? (GOOG)(YHOO)(MSFT)
comScore data from November showed that total online searches done in the US declined 4.7% compared to October. The figure fell to just over 10 billion. With one fewer day in the month some…
Merrill Lynch Sells Most of Commercial Finance Unit (MER, GE)
General Electric (NYSE: GE) is acquiring most of Merrill Lynch Capital, which is the unit of Merrill Lynch (NYSE: MER) wholly-owned middle-market commercial finance business. Unfortunately the financial terms are not disclosed. This will…
Amazon (AMZN) Sales Show Apple (AAPL) And Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) Doing Well
A look at the top-selling PCs on Amazon (AMZN) shows that Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) and Apple (AAPL) are doing unusually well. The HP Pavillion line is doing especially well, as are the Apple (AAPL) Mac…
Europe Markets 12/24/2007
Markets in Europe were higher at 6.40 AM New York time. The FTSE rose .4% to 6,462. Barclays (BCS) was up 2.8% to 518.5. RBS (RBS) was up 2.3% to 445.50. The DAXX rose…
Apple (AAPL) iPhone Give Carriers Hope For New Dollars
Cell carriers like AT&T (T) and Vodafone (VOD) have run into the problem that their home markets are becoming saturated. By many estimates, there are over 250 million cellphones in the US. AT&T, Verizon…
Deepest Retail Discounters Draw Most Traffic
It makes all of the sense in the world. The stores offering the best discounts are getting most of the traffic this holiday season. But, that may be a mixed blessing. According to data…
As Credit Card Defaults Soar, New Danger For Banks
The mortgage-backed financial instruments that have gone such a long way to hurt brokerages like Merrill Lynch (MER) and banks like Citigourp (C) may be just the start of a wave of writes-offs.The next…
UK Likely To Be More Aggressive Than Fed On Rate Cuts
While it is unclear that the Fed will cut rates more next year, it appears that the Bank of England may make as many as four cuts. Perhaps the UK central bank is more…
NYSE Short Interest For Mid-December, Financial Stocks Up
For the December 14 period, short interest in financial stocks sky-rocketed compared to figures on November 30. Shares sold short in Citigroup (C) grew 20 million to 104.9 million. Shares short in MBIA (MBI)…
Media Digest 12/24/2007 Reuters, WSJ, NYTimes, FT, Barron’s
According to Reuters, retailers offering the sharpest discounts got the lion’s share of this year’s holiday customers. CostCo (COST) and Wal-Mart (WMT) made the list. The Wall Street Journal writes that a final push…
Amazon Best Sellers: Nintendo And Activision (ATVI)
Which companies are likely to big holiday sales? In the video game category Activision (ATVI) and Nintendo are the leaders on the Amazon (AMZN) bestseller list for video games. Activision (ATVI) has four games…
Amazon (AMZN) Best Sellers: Garmin (GRMN), Apple (AAPL), And Canon
Which companies are likely to have a good Christmas and fourth quarter? A look at Amazon’s (AMZN) "Best Sellers" lists may say something. In the "Electronics" category the Apple (AAPL) iPod, Gamin (GRMN) GPS…
China Wants To Kill BHP Billiton (BHP) Bid For Rio Tinto (RTP)
As a huge consumer of metals, China does not want to see a merger between Rio Tinto (RTP) and BHP Billiton (BHP). The new company might have too much leverage in raising prices. So,…
As Saudis Raise Money, US Companies Go On Sale (C)(MER)(AMD)(MS)
Saudi Arabia is sick of the big sovereign funds in China and Abu Dhabi kicking sand in its face. The country plans to put a fund in place that will "dwarf Abu Dhabi’s $900bn"…