“(MoneyWatch) Labor strife between American Airlines and its pilots is grounding flights and angering passengers affected by flight cancellations and delays.

The bankrupt carrier says it has had to cancel hundreds of flights because of an increase in the number of pilots calling in sick. The pilots, angry over a contract imposed on them cutting their pay and benefits, also appear to be causing problems when they do show up. In the last month, four times as many flights as usual have been cancelled for maintenance issues resulting from last-minute plane inspections ordered by pilots.

In a report earlier this week, Ray Neidl, an analyst with Maxim Group, wrote that the pilots were the most important labor group at American, and that a deal with them was crucial.”

Full article

“Apple has finally made a real statement to its customers apologizing about the Maps dramathat’s been unfolding over the past few weeks with the introduction of iOS 6. According to CEO Tim Cook, the company “fell short” on its commitment to bring world-class products to its customers.

Last week, the only comment we got out of Apple was that this is “just the start.”

Within the letter, Cook makes mention of Google Maps being the first version of Maps on iOS, but that “as time progressed, [they] wanted to provide customers with even better Maps including features such as turn-by-turn directions, voice integration, Flyover and vector-based maps.”

Full article

“(Reuters) – T-Mobile USA, the No. 4 U.S. mobile provider, has agreed to sell the rights to operate 7,200 of its wireless broadcast towers for $2.4 billion to Crown Castle International Corp to help its parent Deutsche Telekom pay back debt.

Crown Castle also has the option to pay another $2.4 billion to buy the towers outright from T-Mobile USA at the end of the lease term for each tower, under the deal announced Friday.

T-Mobile USA has been trying to sell its wireless towers since its proposed purchase by AT&T Inc failed last year due to regulatory opposition.

T-Mobile USA, which is spending $4 billion on a network upgrade, has also been looking for ways to become more financially independent from its parent.

Crown Castle estimates the towers will generate about $125 million to $130 million in adjusted funds from operations before financing costs in 2013.”

Full article

“(Reuters) – Bank of America (BAC.N) said it will pay $2.43 billion to settle a class action lawsuit with investors who held its securities at the time the company announced plans to acquire Merrill Lynch.

The company expects to incur total litigation expense of about $1.6 billion for the quarter ending September 30.

The litigation expense and a U.K. tax charge are expected to hurt the bank’s third-quarter earnings by about 28 cents per share, the company said in a statement.

The bank will also institute certain corporate governance enhancements until January 1, 2015, under the settlement.”

Full article

“Security experts say the recent “denial of service” cyberattacks on big U.S. banks were the largest ever recorded by a wide margin. Since Sept. 19, the banking websites of Bank of America Corp. (NYSE: BAC), J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM), Wells Fargo & Co. (NYSE: WFC), U.S. Bancorp. (NYSE: USB) and PNC Financial Services Group Inc. (NYSE: PNC) have all suffered day-long slowdowns and been at times unreachable for many customers.

It is not unusual for banks to get hit by cyberattackers and they have some of the best defenses against them. But this time the volume of traffic sent to these sites in order make then crash was unprecedented — 10 to 20 times the volume that normally seen.”

Read more

Gapping up

CT +27.8%, RIMM +17.2%, AZZ +12.8%, ASTX +11.3%, OSUR +4.4%, ACN +3.7%,

HIG +1.6%, FB +1.6%, RMBS +1.3%,  SYT +2.1%

Gapping Down 

EMKR -6.3%, CLWR -4.1%, HTGC -3.7%, NKE -3.6%, WMC -3.5%, MT -3.2%,

CWST -3%, TEF -2.5%, YUM -2.4%, CIT -1.8%, CS -1.8%, RDS.A -1.5%,

NOK -1.5%, MCD -1.4%, RCL -1.3%,

The problem is not widespread and Apple is replacing devices for those experiencing the problem.

Full article

“European Union regulators are preparing to charge Microsoft for failing to comply with a 2009 ruling ordering the company to offer users of its desktop operating system a choice of web browsers,Reuters is reporting.

The EU opened an investigation into the case back in July, to determine whether Microsoft had kept the commitments it made under the antitrust ruling which stipulated users should be offered a choice of browsers to ensure a more level playing field for competitors to Microsoft’s Internet Explorer browser.

At the time of the investigation Microsoft conceded it had “fallen short” of the ruling — a mea culpa flagged up by EU Competition Commissioner Joaquin Almunia in the latest comments on the case.

“The next step is to open a formal proceeding into the company’s breach of an agreement. We are working on this,” Reuters quotes Almunia as saying. ”It should not be a long investigation because the company itself explicitly recognized its breach of the agreement.”

We’ve reached out to Microsoft and the EC for comment and will update once we hear back. Microsoft said its July 2012 statement on browser choice compliance still stands — in which it admits “falling short”, apologizes for doing so and blames the failure on a “technical error”:

Due to a technical error, we missed delivering the BCS [browser choice screen] software to PCs that came with the service pack 1 update to Windows 7. The BCS software has been delivered as it should have been to PCs running the original version of Windows 7, as well as the relevant versions of Windows XP and Windows Vista. However, while we believed when we filed our most recent compliance report in December 2011 that we were distributing the BCS software to all relevant PCs as required, we learned recently that we’ve missed serving the BCS software to the roughly 28 million PCs running Windows 7 SP1.”

Full article

“Twitter has always grown up in the shadow of Facebook (FB).

Facebook was started in 2004 in the dorms of Harvard.  Twitter was started when Jack Dorsey sent an SMS message at 9:50pm PT on March 21, 2006.

Facebook got more early venture capital money. It saw bigger growth. It attracted more “mainstream tech” managerial talent like Owen Van Natta, Gideon Yu fresh off of selling YouTube to Google (GOOG), and Sheryl Sandberg to come in as COO.  Facebook’s revenues have been bigger and faster in coming compared to Twitter. And, of course, Facebook IPO’ed last May, while conventional wisdom is that possibility is still a couple of years away for Twitter.

Facebook is currently worth $60 billion.  The last venture round — pre-Facebook face plant — valued Twitter at $8.4 billion.

Facebook’s trailing twelve months of revenue is $4.33 billion (which was less than Yahoo! (YHOO) over the same period for a little perspective). Twitter’s mobile-related 2012 revenue is expected to come in around $130 million according to eMarketer.

So, while Twitter isn’t “bigger” than Facebook from a market cap or revenue perspective — that might take another 4 years — it is already “bigger” in a couple of important ways.”

Full article

Typical behavior…

Full article

First they were accused and settled a case of racism when it came to selling homes and mortgages. Now they are being accused of maintaining foreclosures better in white neighborhoods vs ethnic and black communities. SHAME ON YOU!

Full article

ALXN, AMGN, ARNA, BIIB, CELG, DNDN, GILD, ILMN, ONXX, PCYC, REGN, VRTX, VVUS, IBB,

Biotech short interest on the rise

BHI, BP, CHK, CVX, COP, EPD, XOM, KMI, NOV, PSX, SLB, RIG, VLO,

Oil & Gas short interest falls

INTC, AMD, QCOM, ARMH, MU, SNDK, BRCM, MRVL, NVDA, TXN, AMAT, SMH

No change in short interest for chip stocks

ALU, BAC, BKS, DNDN, DMND, FB, FSLR, GMCR, GRPN, LNKD, NFLX, NOK, RSH, RIMM, SIRI, ZNGA,

Popular stocks update

Gapping up

CPRT +7.7%, SCMP +7.1%, CAMP +5.3%, IDCC +4.3%, GWR +2.8%, CCL +1.8%,

TGAL +1.7%, BUD +1.6%, WFR +1.1%, KFT +1.1%, KFY +1%, CYH +1%,  WCN +0.7% ,

RIG +0.5%,

Gapping down 

OMN -8.6%, TKMR -7.5%, DB -4.4%, JBL -4.2%, SNX -3.6%, ANR -2.1%, MT -1.6%

“Sharp Corp. (6753) plans to cut more than 10,000 jobs, or about 18 percent of its workforce, and is in talks to sell plants as the Japanese TV maker tries to return to profit, two people with knowledge of the proposal said.

The job cuts and sales of television factories in Mexico, China and Malaysia and U.S. solar developer Recurrent Energy LLC were in the plan Sharp presented to its lenders Sept. 24, the people said, declining to be identified because the matter isn’t public. Sharp is negotiating with Foxconn Technology Group to dispose of the three plants, the people said.”

Full article

Anglo Gold and Gold Fields have shut down about 39% of their production capacity due to wide spread miner strikes.

Full article

Gapping up 

PPHM +12.1%, GENE +7.5%, UDRL +5.2%, OKS +3.3%, MKTX +1.7%, PNR +1.4%, OKE +1.4%,

BWLD +1.5% ,  SWY +1.9%,  SWY +1.9%, AREX +1.5%,  LF +2.2%, AMPE +7.8% ,

Gapping down 

TSLA -9.8%, FWRD -6.6%, PNNT -4.1%, NMFC -4%, NEPT -3.8%, PAYX -3.7%, RSH -3.6%,

HR -3.4%, EPD -3.1%, RHT -2.9%, DV -2.5%, BIOF -2.5%, CAT -1.6%, DECK -1.4%,

ADP -1.1% , PWE -0.5%,

“(Reuters) – The National Restaurant Association said Tuesday it is joining the opposition to a proposed $7.2 billion settlement between some retailers and Visa Inc and MasterCard Inc over fees for credit card transactions.

The NRA, which represents the $600 billion U.S. restaurant industry, is the last of six trade groups leading the case to weigh in on the potentially historic settlement.

The trade group’s chief concern is that the settlement would prohibit all merchants that use Visa and MasterCard – whether they decide to opt in or opt out of the settlement – from filing future lawsuits over interchange issues.”

Full article

$TSLA is down 8% and has been down as much as 12% on a SEC filing warning about sales and production….

Full report

CAT , OKE, BWLD, BRK.A, MEG, TIVO, ADT, LXK, PNR, DV, SNY, GOOG, HPQ, RHT, TSLA, PAYX,

Full report

$CAT lowered their profit range from $15-$18 to $12-$15 on lower commodity prices and consumption. Short of calling a recession the company sees poor economic conditions as far pout as 2015.

Full article