Despite the jump in sales this year is expected to be tough….
Comments »UniCredit’s Stock and Offering Flounder; BAC on the Hook
Unicredit had a dismal showing for their stock offering. The stock tanked triggering a rights offering. If no buyers step up then the lead underwriter BAC may have to take down the position.
Comments »FLASH: TEBOW WINS AGAIN
Tim Tebow threw for an 80 yard td against the Steelers, in overtime, on the first play in OT.
Gods loves Tebow time.
Comments »Report: Jay Z and Beyonce Reserve Entire Floor at Lennox Hill Hospital for Birth Delivery
It was a girl and it cost a cool $1.3 million for the entire floor.
Comments »State of the Nation: Upward Mobility is Up in Smoke
Moody’s Picks Up a 50% Stake in Copal Partners
Brystol Myers To Buy Inhibitex for $2.5 Billion
HUGE PREMIUM: Bristol-Myers Squibb To Buy Inhibitex For About $2.5 Bln – Update
Biopharmaceutical firm Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. (BMY: News ) Sunday said it will acquire hepatitis C drug developer Inhibitex Inc. (INHX: News ) for $26.00 per share in cash pursuant to a cash tender offer and second step merger. The boards of directors of both companies have approved the deal, valued at about $2.5 billion. The lead HCV asset of Inhibitex is INX-189, an oral nucleotide polymerase or NS5B inhibitor in Phase II development that has exhibited potent antiviral activity.
The acquisition is expected to be dilutive to Bristol-Myers Squibb’s earnings through 2016, with an expected impact on earnings per share of about $0.04 in 2012 and around $0.05 in 2013. Inhibitex’s board agreed to recommend that its shareholders tender their shares in the offer. In addition, shareholders with beneficial ownership of about 17% of Inhibitex’s common stock reached agreements with Bristol-Myers to support the transaction and to tender their shares in the tender offer.
Also, the deal provides for both the parties to effect a merger to be completed following the tender offer closure, which would result in all shares not tendered in the tender offer being converted into the right to receive $26.00 per share cash, Bristol-Myers added.
Lamberto Andreotti, chief executive, Bristol-Myers Squibb stated, “The acquisition of Inhibitex builds on Bristol-Myers Squibb’s long history of discovering, developing and delivering innovative new medicines in virology and enriches our portfolio of investigational medicines for hepatitis C.” Commenting on the transaction, Russell Plumb, President and Chief Executive of Inhibitex said, “Bristol-Myers Squibb’s expertise in antiviral drug development, and its existing complementary portfolio, will assure that the potential of INX-189 is realized as part of future oral combination therapies for millions of patients in need around the world.”
The companies anticipate that the tender offer would close around 30 days after commencement of the tender offer. Citi is serving as financial advisor to Bristol-Myers Squibb in relation with the purchase and Kirkland & Ellis LLP is its legal advisor.
BMY ended Friday’s trading session at $34.22 on a volume of 7.91 million shares on the NYSE, while INHX closed at $9.87 on a volume of 2.99 million shares on the Nasdaq.
Comments »Study: Is Fox News Too Balanced?
By Paul Bedard
It’s not easy being Fox News in today’s highly politicized media environment. When it says it’s “fair and balanced,” the mainstream media sneer disbelief. When the cable news ratings leader reveals figures proving its coverage is balanced on a specific hot-button issue, it gets slapped for pandering to conservative dogma.
That’s a conclusion one might reach from a first-of-its-kind study in the authoritative International Journal of Press/Politics of how Fox, CNN, and MSNBC cover the issue of global warming. The bottom line: Being balanced and providing supportive and critical views of global warming is actually biased because it gives critics a louder voice. Worse: Fox covers global warming about twice as much as CNN and MSNBC combined, meaning those critics get much more airtime, another sign of bias.
“Although Fox discussed climate change most often, the tone of its coverage was disproportionately dismissive,” says the study by four professors, two from George Mason University, the others from Yale and American University. They wrote, “Fox broadcasts were more likely to include statements that challenged the scientific agreement on climate change, undermined the reality of climate change, and questioned its human causes.”
The new study looked at global warming stories on the three networks in 2007-08, the peak of coverage of the issue. Of 269 stories, 182 were on Fox, 66 on CNN, and 21 on MSNBC. About 60 percent of the Fox stories had a “dismissive” tone, while less than 20 percent were “accepting” of global warming. Over 70 percent of those on CNN and MSNBC accepted the global warming argument, which the study authors also endorse. There were no “dismissive” stories on MSNBC, and just 7 percent on CNN, a proper balance, the study suggests.
The authors also looked at the opinions of guests. Here Fox again out-balanced the competition. Of Fox’s 149 guests, 59 believed in global warming, 69 didn’t, with the rest someplace in the middle. Of CNN’s 53 story guests, 41 were “climate change believers” and nine were “doubters.” On MSNBC, 11 of 20 guests were believers.
The study acknowledges that Fox was the most balanced from the numbers perspective, but the network still gets an F. The reason, it says, is because viewers are influenced by what they see, and seeing more critics of global warming makes more viewers critics. “The more often people watched Fox News, the less accepting they were of global warming. Conversely, frequent CNN and MSNBC viewing was associated with greater acceptance of global warming,” the study concludes.
Comments »Bernanke Pursuing Anti-Greenspan Strategy: Transparency
Former Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan clearly reveled in his reputation as a mystical overseer of U.S. fiscal policy, an oracle whose vision and judgment rose above the banalities of common economic debate.
In hindsight, that didn’t work out so well. It turns out real estate prices wouldn’t rise forever.
The 2008 financial crisis and its extended aftermath have put a significant dent in Greenspan’s reputation, not to mention the Fed’s. Now it seems Greenspan’s successor, Ben Bernanke, is on a one-man mission to restore that reputation.
A key element of Bernanke’s strategy has been increasing transparency related to Fed policy decisions and generally seeking to demystify the once-secretive entity, essentially taking the opposite approach as Greenspan.
Bernanke’s open-door policy has picked up steam as the U.S. economy has struggled to recover from the deep recession that followed the collapse of the U.S. housing market.
“I think the secrecy of the Fed hasn’t worked, especially in this past financial market.”
– Mark Williams, former Federal Reserve Bank examiner
First it was press conferences, unprecedented for the top policy maker of the U.S. central bank. Now, in a move announced earlier this week, the Fed plans to start publishing its forecasts for interest rates, presumably in an effort to provide business owners and investors greater clarity regarding future policy decisions that may spring from the Fed.
What this means is that the Fed, beginning at its January 24/25 meeting, will release interest rate forecasts provided by Fed policy makers. In addition, the Fed will release specific predictions from policy makers as to when the Fed might start raising interest rates.
Long-time Fed watchers recall that the Fed only started announcing its interest rate changes in 1994.
“I think (the shift toward transparency) is a good thing. It should help businesses gauge their activity based on the fact that the Fed won’t surprise,” said Peter Cardillo, chief market analyst at Rockwell Global Capital. “At least they’ll try not to surprise. Anything can happen.”
The thinking goes that if employers are fairly certain that interest rates are going to remain low for the foreseeable future, that certainty might serve as a powerful incentive to take advantage of these historically-low interest rates to borrow money for expansion.
“From that perspective, it might help employers to accelerate hiring,” said Cardillo.
Cardillo said Bernanke seems willing to take unorthodox steps, including opening up the Fed to closer public scrutiny, for several reasons. First, he’s “desperately trying to get the economy growing at a more respectable level,” according to Cardillo.
Second, Bernanke wants to restore the Fed’s credibility in the wake of criticism that Fed policy makers were asleep at the wheel as the U.S. credit bubble expanded at an alarming rate a decade ago as borrowing levels rose unchecked.
Finally, Cardillo believes a bit of certainty in the U.S. could provide some much-needed counterbalance to the pervasive uncertainty overseas, primarily in Europe where the long-running debt crisis has threatened a global meltdown for over two years.
Simply put, the Fed’s rate projections are intended to allow businesses to adjust to potential shifts in interest rates well in advance of the actual change.
Interest rates were lowered to a range of 0.25% to 0% over three years ago during the worst of the financial crisis in an effort to spur lending and give a boost to the ailing U.S. economy.
Historically low interest rates weren’t enough to lift ailing housing and labor markets, however, so the Fed got creative. First by introducing massive bond buying programs that pumped more than $2 trillion in cash into the economy, and later by shifting its portfolio to include a higher percentage of long-term securities. The latter was an effort to boost the moribund housing market by driving down mortgage rates.
Neither of these purely fiscal policies has had much of an impact.
In April, Bernanke held the first press conference ever by a U.S. Fed chairman. Then in August the Fed broke from its long-standing tradition of avoiding specific timelines by announcing it would keep interest rates at their current low levels until at least mid-2013. Each of these two transparency moves was intended to open up the Fed process and reduce uncertainty.
“I think the secrecy of the Fed hasn’t worked, especially in this past financial market,” said Mark Williams, a former Federal Reserve Bank examiner and a finance lecturer at Boston University.
Williams takes a less benevolent view of Bernanke’s transparency strategy, arguing that the Fed chairman seems determined to put the Fed back in control of the fiscal steering wheel.
The Fed has been dragged “kicking and screaming” to its new policy of openness, Williams said, pushed by markets that have grown skeptical of the Fed’s ability to influence the sluggish economy.
“Over the last 3½ years the markets haven’t been pleased with how central banks have handled financial crisis,” said Williams, citing both rounds of quantitative easing, the two programs in which the Fed bought massive quantities of government bonds.
“The Fed has become reactionary,” he said. “Instead of the market reacting to the Fed, the Fed has been reacting to the market. Bernanke wants to get back in control. It’s a perception game, a PR campaign.”
By releasing interest rate projections, the Fed is trying to get out ahead of the markets, Williams explained. In any case, Williams said he generally applauds the effort.
“Markets work best when they have timely, accurate and transparent information. The Fed is coming into the 21st century kicking and screaming, but at least it’s making the attempt,” he said.
Read more: http://trade.cc/wju#ixzz1inU6d64z
Comments »Romney Up Big in N.H. as Lead Widens, Polls Show
Updated: January 7, 2012 | 9:36 a.m.
January 6, 2012 | 6:44 p.m.
Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has a commanding lead in the Jan. 10 New Hampshire Republican primary, according to three new polls released Friday that show Romney could become the first nonincumbent to sweep the first two GOP nominating contests in the modern campaign calendar.
The three polls all show Romney—who currently holds a slender lead in Iowa—blowing out the competition next week in his adopted home state, while former Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., has received only a modest bump following his surprising surge to a virtual tie for first place in Iowa on Tuesday. Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, is in second place in each of the three surveys, while former House Speaker Newt Gingrich is fading. Former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman, who is staking his entire primary campaign on a strong performance in the Granite State, trails badly in each of the polls.
- Suffolk University in Boston, which has been conducting a two-day tracking poll for Boston-based WHDH-TV since Dec. 30, released its first poll conducted entirely after the Iowa caucuses. The latest results—compiled from interviews with likely primary voters on Wednesday and Thursday—show Romney leading Paul, 40 percent to 17 percent. Santorum runs third, at 11 percent, while Gingrich is fourth, at 9 percent. Huntsman is at 8 percent, and Texas Gov. Rick Perry earns just 1 percent of the vote.
- The University of New Hampshire Survey Center conducted a poll for WMUR-TV in Manchester, N.H., from Monday through Thursday. In the full poll, Romney led Paul, 44 percent to 20 percent, with Gingrich and Santorum tied at 8 percent. Huntsman is at 7 percent. But UNH also provided results for the last two days of the poll, following Iowa: Romney leads with 43 percent, followed by Paul (18 percent), Santorum (11 percent), Gingrich (9 percent), and Huntsman (7 percent).
- A new NBC News/Marist poll, conducted on Wednesday and Thursday, shows Romney leading Paul, 42 percent to 22 percent. Santorum jumped to third place, with 13 percent, followed by Gingrich and Huntsman, each at 9 percent.
As in Iowa and other states, the New Hampshire polls show a significant drop in Gingrich’s support. In the NBC News/Marist poll, Gingrich has plummeted 15 points since late November, arguably the peak of his candidacy.
The polls also show the breadth of Romney’s lead. He leads across genders, among most age groups (Paul leads among those voters 18-34 in the UNH poll but not the Suffolk poll), and among those voters who identify with the tea party and those who do not.
The UNH poll crosstabs also break out the horse race by religion, and the poll shows that Santorum has not yet made significant inroads with Catholic voters, who made up 38 percent of the 2008 primary electorate. Santorum captures the vote of 10 percent of Protestants, and just 9 percent of Catholics.
Campaigning in Tilton, N.H., Romney sounded a note of caution about the results.
“I know some pollsters say I’m doing real well. Let me tell you, those polls, they can just disappear overnight,” he said. “What you say to a pollster is a bit like going on a date. It’s like well, I might try this but you know, getting married, that’s something else. So we need to make sure you’re working real hard and I’ll keep working real hard.”
Meanwhile, President Obama continues to face tough sledding in the Granite State. Just 40 percent of all New Hampshire registered voters approve of the job he is doing as president, according to the poll, equal to his poor approval rating in late November. Nearly half of voters—49 percent—disapprove of Obama’s job performance.
The Suffolk University poll surveyed 500 likely primary voters, for a margin of error of plus or minus 4.4 percentage points.
The UNH poll surveyed 631 likely primary voters, for a margin of error of plus or minus 3.9 percentage points. That includes 318 interviews conducted after the Iowa caucuses; those results have a margin of error of plus or minus 5.5 percentage points.
The NBC News/Marist was conducted by Marist College in Poughkeepsie, N.Y. The poll surveyed 2,263 registered voters, for a margin of error of plus or minus 2.1 percentage points. There were 711 likely GOP primary voters, for a margin of error of plus or minus 3.7 percentage points.
Wall St. Gurus Find Prediction Game Getting Harder
By Joseph A. Giannone and Jessica Toonkel
NEW YORK (Reuters) – With every new year comes a new round of bold predictions for financial markets.
Bill Gross, the manager of the world’s largest bond fund, kicked off the year calling the current market “paranormal.” He forecast a 2012 characterized by “credit and zero-bound interest rate risk.
Blackstone (BX.N: Quote) Vice Chairman Byron Wien, among the securities industry’s best known prognosticators, on Tuesday unveiled his latest crop of 10 “surprises” for the coming year. BlackRock (BLK.N: Quote) Vice Chairman Bob Doll is bullish on stocks, while one well-known forecaster declared 2012 too hard to predict and declined to offer a forecast.
Among some predictions: Doll foresees double-digit U.S. stock returns, while Wien sees benchmark oil prices plunging to $65 a barrel.
In the past — before U.S. housing prices fell and kept falling for the first time since the Depression or the future of Eurozone was at risk — their educated guesses had a good chance of being right.
But these days, market volatility is the norm and far-flung political events can send U.S. markets into a tailspin. Skeptics contend it is hard to predict what the world will look like tomorrow, let alone 12 months from now.
Indeed, that led Birinyi Associates’ Laszlo Birinyi, whose stock market forecasts were widely followed, to tell clients this month that he would not be making predictions this year.
“There are too many variables which are beyond our comprehension,” he wrote in his January client newsletter.
Read the rest here.
Comments »Best Buy Becomes No Buy As Same Store Sales Fall
GE and Siemens Pick Up Foreign Solar and Turbine Orders
Asian Stocks Down on Exports
J&J to Settle Probe With $1 Billion in Cold Cash; No Word Yet on Criminal Plea
Bank Stocks Lead the Circle Jerk Rally
How Considerate: GM Will Fix Your Volt
The volt has had some trouble with fires occurring after the Volt is in an accident. In order to keep up the brand name and push the green theme GM has offered to fix your hunk of metal.
Comments »Johnson & Johnson Recalls Children’s Tylenol After Death and Lawsuit
It is alleged that JNJ knew about the problems and did a stealth recall to save public face….
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