“Hostess Brands Inc., the maker of Wonder bread and Twinkies, said it will shut down and liquidate after a strike by members of its bakery workers’ union “crippled” the company’s operations.

“We deeply regret the necessity of today’s decision, but we do not have the financial resources to weather an extended nationwide strike,” Chief Executive Officer Gregory F. Rayburn said in a statement.  “Hostess Brands will move promptly to lay off most of its 18,500-member workforce and focus on selling its assets to the highest bidders.”

The Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union went on strike Nov. 9 after a bankruptcy judge in White Plains, New York, imposed contract concessions that 92 percent of the union’s workers rejected.”

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“Alcatel-Lucent SA (ALU), the French phone- equipment maker considering asset sales to bolster its finances, is weighing a disposal of some secondary patents as the company seeks ways out of a streak of quarterly losses and a shrinking cash pile, its chief financial officer said.

“We can look to monetize that portfolio through licensing, through limited sales if those patents aren’t part of our core and a few other things,” Paul Tufano said yesterday in an interview at a conference organized by Morgan Stanley in Barcelona. “We look at all of the above.”

Alcatel-Lucent, based in Paris, has almost 30,000 patents and 15,000 patent applications pending, Tufano said.

“It’s a broad variety of technologies that we cover,” he said. “It will be hard to find a company with as broad a patent portfolio as ours, so I think it’s very attractive and there’s a lot of interest and there could be a lot of interest from a lot of different sources.” ”

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“CINCINNATI (Reuters) – Procter & Gamble plans to trim more non-manufacturing jobs through 2016, on top of a 10 percent reduction target it should meet this year, as the largest household-products maker tries to reinvigorate what has become a sluggish organization.

P&G also said it may increase stock repurchases to $6 billion from $4 billion.

P&G remains on track to eliminate about 5,700 non-manufacturing jobs by the end of the current fiscal year that will end in June. It now plans to reduce another 2 percent to 4 percent of its non-manufacturing jobs each year during fiscal 2014, 2015 and 2016.

“These are all continued steps in the right direction, but we wish they had taken bolder ones like even more aggressive cost-cutting,” said Sanford Bernstein analyst Ali Dibadj, who was attending P&G’s bi-annual analyst meeting in Cincinnati on Thursday.

Shares of P&G, a component of the Dow Jones industrial average <.DJI>, were down about 44 cents at $66.08 in late morning trading on the New York Stock Exchange.”

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“NEW YORK (Reuters) – Boeing Co said on Thursday it settled on a “firm concept” for its new 737 MAX jet, and chose Honeywell International Inc and Rockwell Collins Inc to supply new systems for the new plane.

The Chicago-based company also said it expected to see further increases in production rates for the single-aisle 737, its best-selling jet.

Boeing said it has decided on a “firm concept,” finalizing some basic design parameters for the 737 MAX and expects it to use 13 percent less fuel, compared to the current 737s. The plane would include new LEAP-1B engines from CFM International, which combines resources from Snecma, a unit of the Safran Group of France, and General Electric Co .”

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“HOUSTON/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – BP Plc will pay $4.5 billion in penalties and plead guilty to felony misconduct in the Deepwater Horizon disaster, which caused the worst offshore oil spill in U.S. history.

The settlement includes a $1.256 billion criminal fine, the largest such levy in U.S. history, the company said on Thursday. Analysts said the deal let BP put its focus back on oil production, though at least one member of Congress questioned whether it would hurt states’ chances for civil penalties.

The April 2010 explosion on the Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico killed 11 workers. The mile-deep Macondo oil well then spewed 4.9 million barrels of oil into the Gulf over 87 days, fouling shorelines from Texas to Florida and eclipsing in severity the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska.”

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“WASHINGTON—U.S. energy-market regulators Wednesday handed J.P. Morgan Chase JPM -1.91% & Co.’s energy-trading unit a six-month suspension from some of its activities in electricity markets, the latest in a string of clashes with Wall Street.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission cited false information it has said the company submitted as part of a probe into alleged market manipulation.

It was a rare move for the commission and another signal that it is trying to assert itself as a regulatory heavy hitter. The agency, which oversees transmission lines and natural-gas pipelines, also recently proposed a record penalty of nearly $470 million against Barclays BARC.LN +1.24% PLC for alleged market manipulation. Barclays denies the charges.

The last time the commission took away a company’s market privileges broadly, rather than in limited geographic areas, was when it revoked the privileges of Enron Corp., a FERC official said.”

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ANF, AAPL, ADP, BHI, CVC, CTSH, CS, DD, F, GPN, HAL, HAR, HOLX, IAG, MGI, NTAP, PAYX, PWR, SB, SZYM, SPLS, TWC, WLT,

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“$MS just published its November read on its proprietary Business Conditions Index, and it dropped 6 points to 35%. This follows last month’s stunning 14 point plunge.

“Rising fiscal policy uncertainty is having an increasingly negative impact on business activity as the fiscal cliff looms, write the economists led by Vincent Reinhart. “After the status quo election results, the ideological divide that blew up the “Grand Bargain” in 2011 still exists. Risks are significant that a fiscal cliff deal won’t be reached by January 1, potentially a major blow to an economy that appears to be moving into year end with little momentum.”

This only reinforces the idea the U.S. consumers and the U.S. businesses are experiencing the economy very differently.  Specifically, the consumer has been feeling more confident thanks to emerging bullish trends like the rebound in home prices.  Meanwhile, businesses are becoming increasingly cautious as the fiscal cliff looms.

Read more

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“BP Plc (BP/), the owner of the Macondo well that in 2010 caused the worst U.S. oil spill, said it’s in talks with the government on resolutions to all criminal claims against the company.

BP is in “advanced discussions” with the Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission, the U.K. oil producer said in a statement today. The proposed resolutions won’t cover civil claims under the Clean Water Act, natural resource damages or private claims not included in a previous settlement with victims, it said.”

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“Setting a key portion of its white collar enforcement agenda for a second term, the Obama administration on Wednesday announced a renewed focus on bribes paid by U.S. companies to foreign officials.

A new set of guidelines issued Wednesday by the Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission comes in the face of complaints by business groups that the crackdown — which began in the Bush administration and accelerated under President Barack Obama — is hurting U.S. competitiveness.”

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“Investors yanked a record volume of cash from BlackRock Inc.’s exchange-traded fund that buys junk bonds as the notes lose value for the first month since May.

The $16.3 billion fund reported an outflow of 2.4 million shares yesterday, equal to about $218.9 million, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That’s the biggest daily withdrawal in the five-year history of the iShares iBoxx High Yield Corporate Bond Fund, the largest of its kind.”

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“(Reuters) – General Motors said it is recalling 15,575 Cadillac, Buick and Chevrolet cars to correct potential safety flaws.

The recalls, posted Wednesday by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, involve 2,949 2012-model Buick Verano, Chevrolet Cruze and Chevrolet Sonic compacts with driver-side air bags that might not deploy in a crash, and 12,626 2013-model Cadillac XTS sedans with rear-seat head restraints that might not lock in position.

The problems could increase the risk of injury to occupants, NHTSA said.”

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“The company intends to use the Chapter 11 process to significantly reduce its debt profile, reorganize other financial obligations and create a strong financial foundation for the Company’s future. Certain subsidiaries, including those that manage the Company’s facilities in Manila, Singapore, Greece, London and Newcastle, have not filed for Chapter 11 reorganization. A complete list of the OSG entities which filed, and those which did not file, Chapter 11 petitions, is available at www.kccllc.net/osg. OSG intends to work with its constituencies to emerge from bankruptcy as quickly as possible while maintaining the company’s market position, business model and strategy.”

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Gapping up

TCX +19.6%, FRO +10.2%, VIPS +8.6%, CSCO +7.7%, CEDC +5.6%, HMIN +5.6%,

RPRX +4.2%, INCY +3.3%, WWD +3.2%, NOK +3%, MT +2.2%, JNPR +2%,

BRCM +1.8%,  WFT +2.2%,

Gapping down 

ENVI -18.1%, OSG -11.5%, LODE -7.5%, MOS -5.1%, SEP -4.5%, UBNT -3.3%,

IAG -3.1%, AMD -1.9%, SEE -1.7%, POT -1.4%, AGU -1.4%, CF -1.4%, TM -1.3%,

SNE -0.6%,  SI -0.6%,  HD -0.2%,

“The Securities and Exchange Commission has deepened its probe into whetherKnight Capital Group Inc. KCG -2.01% did enough to police its trading systems before computer errors nearly destroyed the brokerage.

The inquiry, which began after Knight’s errant Aug. 1 trades saddled it with more than $450 million in losses, initially focused more narrowly on what caused the errors. The probe has broadened to look further at the company’s risk-control procedures and Knight’s compliance with a rule implemented last year—called the market-access rule—that requires brokerages to guard against these sorts of problems, say people familiar with the investigation.”

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“PLYMOUTH, Minn. (AP) — The Mosaic Co. says weak international demand for its crop nutrients has hurt sales volumes, which may not pick up until 2013.

The Plymouth, Minn.-based company, which sells phosphate and potash, lowered its second-quarter production guidance and tightened its price forecast as a result.

Shares of the company fell more than 4 percent in after-hours trading on the news.

Mosaic said international crop nutrient market demand has fallen as distributors are holding off on purchases to avoid price risk. The company believes this demand is simply delayed, but said sales volumes may not pick up until 2013.

The company had previously forecast second-quarter potash volumes of 1.6 million to 1.9 million metric tons, which already excluded shipments to India and China. Mosaic now forecasts shipments in the range of 1.3 million to 1.4 million metric tons, as other international buyers have followed suit and held off on purchases.

The company expects its phosphate volume to be in the range of 2.9 million to 3.1 million metric tons, down from its prior forecast of 3 million to 3.4 million metric tons.”

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“BARCELONA (Reuters) – Companies will double or triple spending on cybersecurity in the coming years as attacks grow more sophisticated and frequent, creating a billion dollar business opportunity for U.S. carrier AT&T Inc, it said on Wednesday.

Attacks on AT&T networks have doubled in the past four months and now tend to be more targeted to evade detection, Frank Jules, president of AT&T’s global enterprise unit, said at the Morgan Stanley TMT conference.

“We see them on a daily basis and they are now getting smaller instead of coming in huge waves, which were easier for us to detect,” he said.

“Every chief information officer at major corporations that I meet wants to talk about security. I think this will be a $40 billion market one day.”

Jules said AT&T’s strategy for its global business solutions unit was to accompany big multinationals as they expand overseas to provide them not just with connectivity but new products and services like security and machine-to-machine technology, which puts mobile SIM cards into everything from cars to vending machines.

AT&T said in early November it would boost capital spending on its U.S. network by about 16 percent to $22 billion a year for the next three years to upgrade its wireless and wireline networks.”

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“TOKYO (Reuters) – Toyota Motor Corp <7203.T> said it will recall 2.77 million vehicles worldwide, including some of its popular Prius hybrid cars, for steering and water pump problems in the carmaker’s second multimillion-vehicle recall in a little over a month.

The defects, which Toyota said had caused no accidents and could each be fixed in an hour or so, could cost hundreds of millions of dollars to repair, according Deutsche Securities autos analyst Kurt Sanger.”

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“(Reuters) – Goldman Sachs Group Inc would have $728 billion in risk-weighted assets under yet-to-be-implemented Basel III capital rules, 67 percent more than the investment bank has under current regulations, Chief Executive Lloyd Blankfein said on Tuesday.

Goldman aims to reduce risk-weighted assets to $700 billion by the end of 2013, with $18 billion of that coming from a decrease in credit risk, and another $11 billion coming from a decline in market risk.

Much of the reduction will come from an expiration of existing trades, like mortgage securitization, derivative portfolios and some investments that will be repaid, Blankfein said at a conference in New York hosted by Bank of America Corp .”

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“For the corporation by the corporation”

“Election rhetoric shuns the big picture in favor of the bigger platitude. Now that The Show is over, we are left with the equivalent of a Sunday morning hangover following a binge of promises and lies. We leave the theatre of political spectacle on steroids for the real world of unstable economy, a globally and publicly subsidized financial sector, and increased costs of living on everything from food to education to health-care; outpacing declining median incomes. The average cost for health insurance for a family is $15,745per year vs. a median income of $50,502, or about half post-tax take-home pay.

“Obamacare” is the name commonly used for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) of 2010. The very moniker is indicative of how name-and-image-centric our world has become; Medicare was never called “Johnsoncare” when President Johnson signed it into law in 1965 and Johnson was not exactly a man of small-personality. At any rate, Obamacare or the PPACA ranks as one of the most misrepresented issues from the campaign, by both sides of the ever-slimming aisle.

The Tea-Party Conservative types get it embarrassingly wrong when they call it a “government takeover of health care.” Likewise, Progressive Obama-supporters are deluded in accepting it as the most sweeping healthcare reform since Medicare. (Side note: I wish the word ‘sweeping’ could be retired from politics until it actually means -sweeping.)

Here’s why. The PPACA does nothing to restructure the health insurance industry, anymore than the Dodd-Frank Act restructures the banking industry. This means everything else it attempts to do, positive or negative, will be vastly overshadowed by an industry accelerating to morph itself into a acquisition machine in order to circumvent anything that even smells like a restriction, including laws that exist and ones to come.

How? By doing the same thing energy and telecom companies did after they were deregulated in 1996, and that banks did after they were summarily deregulated (after moving that way for decades) in 1999. They are merging, consolidating, eliminating competitors, and controlling their domain. They are manufacturing power.

Investment bankers are roaming the world to exploit this hot new opportunity. That’s one reason insurance companies don’t even call themselves that anymore. Now, they are ‘managed health care’ companies. Call yourself a managed health care company, and you can buy everything from other insurance companies to hospitals to clinics to doctors. The more consolidation, the more fees bankers rake in, and the more premiums and medical reimbursements and health care procedures, each company can control.”

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