News Summary for August 2, 2011
This is your Benzinga news summary and traders' outlook for Tuesday, August 2, 2011, covering headlines from overnight and Tuesday's pre-market session.
Today in domestic pre-market trading, U.S. equity futures are trading lower even after the House voted to pass a deal to raise the nation's debt ceiling last night.
Earlier this morning, Jefferies upgraded Radisys (NASDAQ: RSYS) to Buy. View all of today's upgrades here.
Jefferies downgraded Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT) to Hold and Benchmark downgraded eResearch Tech (NYSE: ERT) to Hold. View all of today's downgrades here.
Morgan Stanley lowered Auxilium Pharma's (NASDAQ: AUXL) price target to $18 from $26 and JP Morgan lowered Motricity (NASDAQ: MOTR) price target to $14 from $31. View all other analyst ratings here.
Overseas, European markets were lower this morning. Britain's FTSE 100 fell 0.8% and France's CAC 40 slid 0.6% on the session. Asian stocks ended the session lower as well. China's Shanghai Index tumbled 0.9%, Japan's Nikkei 225 fell 1.2%, and Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index slid 1%.
On the economic calendar, personal income, personal spending, and PCE prices are set to be reported at 8:30 a.m. and auto sales are due at 3:00 p.m.
On the commodity front, gold and silver futures are higher in pre-market trading, with gold trading near the $1630 per ounce level. Energy futures are lower with crude oil down about $0.68 at $94.21 per barrel and gasoline futures trading lower by about 0.4%. Natural gas futures are trading higher this morning and copper futures are lower by 0.5% this morning.
On the earnings front, Pfizer (NYSE: PFE) reported Q2 EPS of $0.60 on revenues of $17 billion; The Street was looking for $0.59 per share on revenues of $16.98 billion.
Archer-Daniels Midland (NYSE: ADM) reported Q2 EPS of $0.58 on revenues of $22.87 billion; The Street was looking for $0.85 per share on revenues of $20.43 billion.
Duke Energy (NYSE: DUK) reported Q2 EPS of $0.33 on revenues of $3.53 billion; The Street was looking for $0.31 per share on revenues of $3.31 billion.
NYSE Euronext (NYSE: NYX) reported Q2 EPS of $0.61 on revenues of $661 million; The Street was looking for $0.60 per share on revenues of $652.7 million.
In corporate news, British bank, Barclays (NYSE: BCS) announced this morning a cost-saving initiative to cut 3,000 jobs.
This concludes your news summary for August 2, 2011.
