Daily Highlights: 7.1.09

• Consumers' confidence in economy unexpectedly falls in June, halting a 3-month upward trend.
• Dow Jones industrial average rose 11% during the quarter, while the S&P 500 index surged 15.2%.
• FDIC to propose tough guidelines for PE investors seeking to buy failed banks.
• Home prices fall 0.6% as rate of decline slows.
• IMF’s board of directors plans to issue as much as $150B of bonds.
• Japan’s largest manufacturers rose less than estimated in June, signaling the economy may be slow to recover.
• ANZ says to seek RBS assets in Hong Kong and Singapore.
• US Home Prices fall 0.6% as rate of decline slows; June Consumer Confidence falls to 49.3 vs 54.8.
• Bank of New York Mellon Corp. acquires minority stake in International Derivatives Clearing Group, a unit of Nasdaq.
• BG Group pays $1B for stake in Exco Resources' shale-gas assets in Texas.
• Chrysler cash losses 'slowed down' after restructuring: CEO Marchionne.
• Exelon Corp. cancels plans for now to build a New nuclear plant in Texas.
• Fifth Third Bancorp completed sale of a stake in its processing business, adding $1.2B in Tier 1 common equity.
• Freddie Mac to name Charles E. Haldeman Jr. as its new chief executive.
• Gannett to cut between 1,000-2,000 jobs out of its 41,500-work force in response to continuing newspaper revenue declines.
• Mizuho Financial Group will raise as much as 655B yen ($6.8B) from selling shares after local and overseas investments depleted capital.
• Oshkosh wins $1.05B contract for blast-proof trucks: Pentagon.
• Pfizer said it discontinued phase 3 trial of its Sutent cancer drug.
• Porche's €1.75B loan request rejected by KFW Group.
• Sealy Corp. swings to a loss in Q2 of $5.2,m as revs fell 20% to $298.5M.

Economic Calendar: Data on Construction Spending, ISM Index, Pending Home Sales, Crude Inventories, Auto Sales to be released today.

Earnings Calendar: STZ, DMAN, GIS, LNN, UNF, UNFY.

Recent Egan-Jones Rating Actions: HERSHEY CO/THE (HSY) ARCHER-DANIELS-MIDLAND CO (ADM) KING PHARMACEUTICALS INC (KG) HOSPIRA INC (HSP) H&R BLOCK INC (HRB) ASHLAND INC (ASH) TRW AUTOMOTIVE HOLDINGS CORP (TRW) KIMBERLY-CLARK CORP (KMB) HJ HEINZ CO (HNZ) MICRON TECHNOLOGY INC (MU) MCCORMICK & CO INC/MD (MKC) LENNAR CORP (LEN) CONAGRA FOODS INC (CAG)

Data provided by: Egan-Jones Rating Action

Comments

[svendthrift]

In the FT today a headline screamed that equities have had their best quarter in 20 years. Yet all the real data is bad. Will one of you please explain to me what is going on?

[Anonymous]

"Losses on US credit cards hit a record 10.44 per cent in June, squeezing profit margins for credit card securitisations to a 10-year low, according to Fitch Ratings."
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/1c8b55d4-65d4-11de-8e34-00144feabdc0.html

And just for reminder, the numbers from last three months.
March: 8.41%
April: 8.89 %
May: 9.66 %

[ShankyS]

TD - get on your horse and ride faster. This manipulation is getting out of hand. Pretty sure they are setting up another shorting opportunity for GS so they have higher earnings/profit than XOM (all at the expense of the small investor).

You get the feeling we're playing Hold 'em and GS pot just keeps getting bigger and bigger, small investor keeps going all in with a 7,2 and GS will hold all chips at the end of the day?