Financial Breakfast: Morning News Summary for December 29, 2011

• The largest bond (physically) is New York Cable Railway, which measures approximately 2 feet by 3 feet including coupons, $1000 denomination dated 1884.

Benzinga's Top News

• Italy sold about 7 billion euros in 10-year bonds at auction, versus an anticipated range of between 5 billion and 8.5 billion euros. Italian 10-year yields in turn fell below 7%, however, currently remains near the 7% level.
• Chesapeake Energy Corp CHK announced its plans to sell a pipelines unit to Chesapeake Midstream Partners CHKM for $865 million.
• Silver futures break below September lows at $26.145 per ounce.

Domestic Pre-Market Trading

• U.S. Equity Markets trade higher as Dow futures trade up about 13 points.
• U.S. Dollar trades about 0.5% higher.

Overseas Trading

• European markets are mixed in afternoon trading. Britain's FTSE 100 slid 0.01%, Germany's DAX added 0.17% and France's CAC 40 gained 0.15% on the session.
• Asian stocks ended the session mixed. China's Shanghai added 0.16%, Japan's Nikkei 225 lost 0.29%, and Hong Kong's Hang Seng fell 0.65%
• Italy sold about 7 billion euros in 10-year bonds at auction, versus an anticipated range of between 5 billion and 8.5 billion euros. Italian 10-year yields in turn fell below 7%, however, currently remains near the 7% level.

Upgrades/Downgrades

• DA Davidson upgrades Starbucks SBUX to Buy

• Raymond James downgrades Edenor EDN to Market Perform

On the Economic Calendar

• Initial and Continuing Jobless Claims are set to report at 8:30 a.m. ET
• Chicago PMI is due at 9:45 a.m.
• Pending Home Sales are to report at 10:00 a.m.

Earnings

No Major Earnings this Morning

Corporate News

• Special committee of Fushi Copperweld FSIN announces receipt of revised 'going private' proposal at $9.50 per share
• Chesapeake Energy Corp CHK announced its plans to sell a pipelines unit to Chesapeake Midstream Partners CHKM for $865 million.

Commodities

• Precious metals are trading lower, with gold posting losses of about 2.23%
• Energy futures are trading higher, with crude oil posting gains of about 0.19%
• Natural Gas futures are higher by about 0.67% and copper is trading lower by about 0.5%

Benzinga's Morning Radar

Technical Levels for Futures and Forex

Name	Resistance-2	Resistance-1	Mid Pivot	Support-1	Support-2
E-Mini Dow	12319	12197	12133	12011	11947
E-Mini S&P 500	1272	1258	1250	1236	1229
Gold	1611	1584	1567	1540	1523
Crude	102.74	101.16	100.14	98.56	97.54
Natural Gas	3.22	3.17	3.14	3.09	3.06
EUR/USD	1.3145	1.3042	1.2976	1.2870	1.808
US Dollar Index	81.63	81.28	80.66	80.31	79.69

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