Mar 24, 2010

Daily Markets - Financial News And Opinions

Daily Markets - Financial News And Opinions

Swap Spreads Are Negative - Is It Time To Buy Private Equity?

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 12:01 PM PDT

These are the trading days that we live for at Kanundrum Capital - macro news is making waves in currency and fixed income markets, but the equity markets have yet to meaningfully respond. We have spent considerable effort documenting the flaws in the European “bailout” plan and today the downgrade of Portugal finds us happily short EURUSD. But what about that free money we promised in the headline - is this just a bait-and-switch…au contraire mon fraire.

Swap Spreads
For the first … [visit site to read more]


FMC Technologies Stays Neutral

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 11:51 AM PDT

We are maintaining our Neutral recommendation on FMC Technologies Inc. (NYSE:FTI) with a target price of $64.
 
We like FMC Technologies' diversified product portfolio, specialty service capabilities and proprietary technological expertise. A strong presence in the subsea systems market, growing international operations and the still-favorable outlook for the deepwater offshore markets are other positives in the FMC Technologies story.
 
To date, FMC Technologies has remained … [visit site to read more]

QCOM Wins Femtocell Contract

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 11:33 AM PDT

Qualcomm Inc. (NASDAQ:QCOM) has won its first contract for 3G CDMA femtocell. The company recently entered into a development agreement with Chinese network infrastructure solutions provider ZTE Corp. ZTE plans to target the Chinese as well as North American markets with its 3G CDMA femtocell products.  

A femtocell is a small cellular base station, typically designed for use in a residential or small business environment. This access point communicates to the wireless service … [visit site to read more]

Amdocs Acquires MX Telecom

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 11:17 AM PDT

Amdocs Corp. (NYSE:DOX) recently completed the acquisition of MX Telecom Ltd, a leading mobile payment and messaging aggregator. The transaction is aimed to boost up Amdocs' OpenMarket business that provides a state-of-the-art mobile transaction hub. MX Telecom provides infrastructure and connectivity
for mobile payment and digital content delivery.
Amdocs has taken a strategic decision to globally expand its OpenMarket business in order get an initial foothold in the gradually increasing mobile … [visit site to read more]

General Mills Beats, But Stock Dips

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 11:15 AM PDT

General Mills (NYSE:GIS) reported strong results for the third quarter of fiscal 2010 with adjusted (excluding non-recurring items such as divestiture gains) earnings of 97 cents per share exceeding the Zacks Consensus Estimate of 93 cents and the year-ago earnings of 79 cents per share.
Earnings were driven by strong demand for the company's products amid recessionary conditions, healthy sales growth for “Big G” label cereals and lower commodity costs.
Net sales for the quarter grew 2.6% … [visit site to read more]

Progress Software Tops View

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 11:02 AM PDT

Progress Software Corp. (NASDAQ:PRGS) reported fiscal 2010 first quarter results after the closing bell on Tuesday. The company recorded a GAAP net loss of $1.0 million during the quarter, compared to a GAAP net income of $3.6 million in the year-ago period. Excluding special items, earnings per share came in at 52 cents, beating the Zacks Consensus Estimate by a significant margin of 14 cents.
 
The company reported a 5.5% growth in total revenue to $103.5 million, compared to $96.5 million in … [visit site to read more]

Healthcare “Right” Comes With Responsibility

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 11:01 AM PDT

Do you hear that large sucking sound? Those are the engines of wealth redistribution humming in Washington.

Let’s stop the bulls&%#! President Obama’s healthcare reform, much like many of his other initiatives, is all about wealth redistribution. Whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing is a topic for another post, but that is how I see it. I said as much in January (”Healthcare Reform to Make You Ill”), and I will repeat today:
Ultimately, the reform as drafted is a massive … [visit site to read more]

Peak March: Why The 3rd Month Is A Good Market Indicator

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 11:00 AM PDT

The US stock market advanced yet again yesterday…for the 15th time in 18 trading sessions. Share price gains have become so routine that share price losses have become a distant memory. Sure, stock prices could fall in theory, but not in practice. At least that's how it feels today.
But memories are short…especially investment memories. So let's take a brief stroll down memory lane. The Dow's 103-point advance yesterday lifted the Blue Chip index to its highest level since September … [visit site to read more]

Favorable Data On Dynavax Drug

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 10:46 AM PDT

Dynavax Technologies Corp. (NASDAQ:DVAX) has announced that it intends to present a detailed analysis of safety data on Heplisav, the company's most advanced pipeline candidate. 

Dynavax provided encouraging data on Heplisav's safety profile. The company reported that the candidate's safety profile was comparable to that of GlaxoSmithKline's (NYSE:GSK) Engerix-B. Moreover, no difference was observed in autoimmune adverse events or laboratory markers of autoimmunity in patients receiving … [visit site to read more]

New Home Sales Just Plain Ugly

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 10:44 AM PDT

New Home Sales dropped to an all time record low in February, down 2.2% on the month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 308,000. The one saving grace to the report was that the January numbers, which previously were the all-time record low, were revised to a 315,000 rate from the originally reported 309,000 rate. Thus, relative to where we thought we were on home sales last night, sales were just down 0.3%.
That, however, kind of misses the overall point. The point is that new home sales … [visit site to read more]

Who Else Wants A Real Eastern Europe ETF?

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 10:43 AM PDT

Emerging markets investing has grown in popularity immensely over the past few years, and a host of new ETFs have popped up targeting specific niches in many of the world's most popular developing economies. Once upon a time, the only options available to investors were broad-based funds, we have seen more granular products targeting specific sectors and market capitalizations pop up as of late. In addition to this, several regional funds have grown in popularity, such as ETFs targeting all … [visit site to read more]

Alnylam Gets $20M Payment

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 10:31 AM PDT

Recently, Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:ALNY) earned $20 million as technology transfer payment from Takeda Pharmaceutical. The amount was paid by Takeda as part of the strategic alliance formed by the companies in 2008. The deal is potentially valued at $1 billion. 

In May 2008, Alnylam established a five-year strategic platform alliance with Japanese company Takeda Pharmaceuticals Company Ltd. for RNA (ribo nucleic acid) interference (RNAi) therapeutics in the field of oncology and … [visit site to read more]

Video: Market Movers: MF, PMI, RDN, BA, HNZ, SWK

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 10:20 AM PDT

The latest news and information on U.S. stocks that are moving the market. … [visit site to read more]

Earnings Scorecard: MCRS

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 10:16 AM PDT

In-line Fourth Quarter 
Estimates have been steady for MICROS Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:MCRS) after it reported for the second quarter of fiscal 2010, which were in line with expectations. 

MICROS designs, manufactures, markets, and services enterprise information solutions for the hospitality and specialty retail industries Revenues were down 4.6% from a year ago but were almost flat sequentially. 

Net income came in at $26.1 million or 32 cents per share, in line with expectations. … [visit site to read more]

Video: General Mills Sees Surge In Fiscal 3Q Profit

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 10:05 AM PDT

General Mills (GIS) announced Wednesday that it saw its fiscal 3Q profit soar 15%. … [visit site to read more]

Shell, CNPC In China Gas Deal

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 10:01 AM PDT

Energy major Royal Dutch Shell Plc. (RDS.A) has agreed to jointly develop a natural gas project in China with the country's state-owned entity China National Petroleum Corporation, also known as CNPC. The financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed. 

As per the 30-year deal, which is subject to clearance from the Beijing government, Shell and CNPC will examine and appraise the potential to develop so-called 'tight gas' in a 4,000 square kilometer area in the Jinqiu block … [visit site to read more]

On The Economic Role Of Government

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 10:00 AM PDT

Government's role in an economy has never been properly explained. We will have a go at it ourselves. In a word, government betrays the future.
Government is a profoundly reactionary institution. It always favors its current clients – the present generation of taxpayers – over its clients of the future (who don't pay taxes and don't lobby). It provides protection against foreign invaders and domestic troublemakers. It also attempts to give its clients protection against the … [visit site to read more]

Video: Euro Hits 10-Month Low Against Dollar

Posted: 24 Mar 2010 09:57 AM PDT

A drop in eurozone economic data & a credit rating downgrade for Portugal paved the way for the euro to decline against the dollar this session. … [visit site to read more]

Stock Buy: Cummins Inc.

Posted: 23 Mar 2010 10:00 PM PDT

Cummins Inc. (NYSE:CMI) has a Zacks #1 Rank and trades at 15.1x 2011 consensus EPS estimates.
Cummins would be solid addition to any portfolio seeking growth and income. Analysts estimate that CMI will be able to achieve long-term EPS growth of 12% annually, and its stock has a current dividend yield of 1.2%.
Company Description
Cummins Inc. is one of the leading worldwide designers and manufacturers of diesel engines. The company also produces natural gas engines and engine components and … [visit site to read more]
posted by

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)