Financial Breakfast: Morning News Summary for October 5, 2011
This is your Benzinga news summary and traders' outlook for Wednesday, October 5, 2011, covering headlines from overnight and Wednesday's pre-market session.
Today in domestic pre-market trading, U.S equity futures are trading higher. At last check, Dow futures are up about 70 points or 0.67% and the U.S. dollar trades lower near the $79.45 level.
Earlier this morning, Citigroup upgraded Walt Disney (NYSE: Dis) to Buy and upgraded CBS Corp (NYSE: CBS) to Buy. View all of today's upgrades here.
Deutsche Bank downgraded PerkinElmer (NYSE: PKI) to Hold and Goldman Sachs downgraded Home Depot (NYSE: HD) to Neutral. View all of today's downgrades here.
Jefferies lowered El Paso Electric's (NYSE: EE) price target to $29 from $27 and Citigroup lowered Dow Chemical's (NYSE: DOW) price target to $32 from $37. View all other of today's analyst ratings here.
Overseas, European markets are higher in afternoon trading. Britain's FTSE 100 gained 2.3%, Germany's DAX jumped 3.9% and France's CAC 40 added 3.2% on the session. Asian stocks ended the session lower. Japan's Nikkei 225 slid 0.86%.
Yesterday, Moody's cut Italy's government bond rating by three notches with a negative outlook, citing high levels of debt and funding risks in euro zone countries.
On the economic calendar, MBA Mortgage Applications came in at (4.3%) from a 9.3% prior reading. ADP Employment Change is set to report at 8:15 a.m. and ISM Non-Manufacturing Index is due at 10:00 a.m.
On the commodity front, gold and silver futures are mixed in pre-market trading, with gold trading slightly higher by about 0.1%. Energy futures are higher with crude oil up over 3% near the $78.22 level and gasoline futures are trading higher by about 2%. Natural Gas futures are higher by about 0.7% and copper futures are trading over 1% higher this morning.
On the earnings front, Costco (NASDAQ: COST) reported Q4 EPS of $1.08 on revenues of $28.18 billion; The Street was looking for $1.10 per share on revenues of $27.78 billion.
Yesterday after the close, YUM! Brands (NYSE: YUM) reported Q3 EPS of $0.83 on revenues of $3.27 billion; The Street was looking for $0.83 per share on revenues of $3.1 billion.
In corporate news, Yahoo! (NASDAQ: YHOO) prepares its books as Silver Lake, Alibaba Group, and Russia's Digital Sky Technologies are in serious talks about a potential joint bid for company.
Yesterday, Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) unveiled its new iPhone, the iPhone 4S, with new features including Apple's dual-core A5 chip, an 8MP camera, 1080p HD resolution video recording, and Siri, a voice control assistant. The iPhone 4S will be released on October 14 and will be available on Sprint's (NYSE: S) network, along with Verizon's (NYSE: VZ) and AT&T's (NYSE: T) networks.
This concludes your news summary for October 5, 2011.
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