Stobart, the road haulier whose trucks have spawned a spotters' fan club, said it was seeing no signs of an economic slowdown as it posted a 27pc rise in underlying revenues for the last 14 months. Source: Telegraph Business | 12 May 2008 | 3:00 pm
Reuters - The scheduled start on Monday of a
trial over financing for the $20 billion buyout of Clear
Channel Communications has been delayed until Tuesday.
NEW YORK (Reuters) - The scheduled start on Monday of a trial over financing for the $20 billion buyout of Clear Channel Communications has been delayed until Tuesday.
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Oil and gas stocks lower in early trading as crude-oil prices pulls back from last week’s record highs and investors back away from stocks in the oil services group.
More than 7,000 people were killed in one county of China's Sichuan province alone after a huge earthquake hit the region. Among those affected by the earthquake were children whose middle school building collapsed with around 900 pupils in it. There were no indications of industrial disruption from the tremor but officials said no damage had been found to the huge Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtse river east of Sichuan Source: FT.com - US homepage | 12 May 2008 | 2:44 pm
Cell Genesys, Inc. (NASDAQ: CEGE) plans to offer 7.1 million shares of common stock and warrants at an equivalent of $4.22 per share with a single institutional investor, for an equity offering valued at approximately $30 million. The warrants will have a strike price of $10.00 and can purchase 8.5 million shares. The proceeds from the offering will be used to finance developmental products such as its GVAX treatment for prostate cancer, as well as for general corporate purposes. The offering is expected to close Wednesday. Credit Suisse Securities LLC is the lead placement agent for the offering. The cancer...
Reuters - Stocks were little changed on Monday
as the dollar's rise helped to push oil prices lower, but gains
were offset after Fedex Corp, a package delivery company seen
as a barometer of economic activity, slashed its earnings
forecast.
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks were little changed on Monday as the dollar's rise helped to push oil prices lower, but gains were offset after Fedex Corp, a package delivery company seen as a barometer of economic activity, slashed its earnings forecast.
NextWave Wireless (NASDAQ: WAVE) amended a shelf offering late on Friday by selling stockholders of 9,101,718 shares of common stock to be periodically sold in one or more offerings. This stock has seen a huge run recently, and many investors get cautious on insiders selling shares after a huge move. The filing was originally filed March 21, 2008 and at the time, about 92.7 million shares were outstanding before the offering. Since, about 10 million additional shares have been issued, changing the common stock to be outstanding following the offering to about 101.8 million shares and prompting the amendment. The...
MBIA reports a loss of more than $2 billion for the first quarter, its third straight loss, as a result of a $3.6 billion charge taken by the bond insurer for losses on derivatives.
NEW YORK (Reuters) - IndyMac Bancorp Inc , one of the largest independent U.S. mortgage lenders, posted a first-quarter loss on Monday as it wrote down bad mortgages and grappled with the cost of cutting jobs and closing offices.
BOSTON (MarketWatch) -- Shares of Standard Pacific Corp., one of the hardest-hit builders during the housing downturn, plunged more than 25% on Monday morning after the company reported a wider quarterly loss and booked more impairment charges.
As drug and biotech sector benchmarks edge higher, shares of ImClone Systems fall after analysts at Morgan Stanley issued a downgrade their rating to equal weight.
Wall Street fluctuated in a narrow range Monday, giving up a modest early advance as oil prices ticked lower and the dollar rose. The market's concerns about rising inflation and its... Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 2:18 pm
A profitable airplane-leasing business owned by American International Group Inc. is considering a break from the troubled insurance giant, according to a published report Monday.
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- Treasurys reversed early losses on Monday, sending yields lower, after Chicago Federal Reserve president Charles Evans highlighted the uncertain economic outlook, contrasting other Fed speakers' recent focus on inflation.
Cablevision Systems Corp. will acquire a 97% stake in Newsday, the Long Island, N.Y. newspaper, from Tribune Co. for $650 million, as the cable operator sees a way to expand its advertising reach and promote its New York area sports and entertainment assets.
U.S. stocks rise tentatively, with investors somewhat heartened by gains in the U.S. dollar and oil retreating from record highs, helping offset a profit warning from FedEx Corp.
TORONTO (Reuters) - Research In Motion Ltd is launching a new high-end version of the BlackBerry aimed at its core base of business users, but it hopes the sleek device will also catch on in the broad retail market.
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Cablevision Systems Corp sealed a $650 million deal to buy 97 percent of Newsday Media Group from Tribune Co, the companies said on Monday, after Rupert Murdoch's News Corp withdrew its bid.
The bank, one of the first to suffer from the subprime mortgage meltdown, said any recovery in the US housing market was unlikely this year as it revealed it had set aside $5.8bn as a result of the credit turmoil in the first quarter Source: FT.com - US homepage | 12 May 2008 | 2:05 pm
Reuters - AnnTaylor Stores Corp raised
its first-quarter earnings forecast on Monday, citing lower
inventories and improvement at its LOFT chain, sending shares
of the women's clothing retailer up 11.5 percent. Source: Yahoo! News: Business | 12 May 2008 | 2:03 pm
NEW YORK (Reuters) - AnnTaylor Stores Corp raised its first-quarter earnings forecast on Monday, citing lower inventories and improvement at its LOFT chain, sending shares of the women's clothing retailer up 11.5 percent.
Westpac, the Australian bank, is in talks with junior rival St George Bank about a merger that would create the country's biggest financial services group - a 30bn company with a customer base equal to... Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 1:57 pm
Westpac, the Australian bank, is in talks with junior rival St George Bank about a merger that would create the country's biggest financial services group - a £30bn company with a customer base equal to half the Australian population. Source: Telegraph Business | 12 May 2008 | 1:57 pm
As part of their plan to tame record oil prices, lawmakers are urging the President to stop putting oil in the nation's Strategic Petroleum Reserve(SPR). But some analysts say that won't do much to lower gas prices.
MBIA, the world's largest bond insurer, reported a $2.4bn loss for the first quarter as it took billions of dollars of writedowns on derivatives contracts amid ongoing credit market deterioration Source: FT.com - US homepage | 12 May 2008 | 1:55 pm
Apple (AAPL) appears to have picked up a deal to deliver HBO programming though iTunes according to Portfolio. The new partnership will involve HBO, a unit of Time Warner (TWX) getting a better deal than other video content providers. The business magazine writes that "One possibility is that HBO programming will have a higher retail price than the flat $1.99 fee Apple currently charges for video content; another is that HBO will receive a larger cut of the same flat rate than other iTunes content providers receive." Whether the new deal will sour relationships with other premium video content providers...
Bid speculation helped London equities stay positive on Monday, with further support from part of the financial sector after well-received interim numbers from HSBC.The FTSE 100 rose 15 points to 6,219... Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 1:46 pm
Charter Communications Inc. (NASDAQ: CHTR) managed to post narrower losses for Q1 in 2008. The highly in debt cable company posted a net loss of $358 million, or -$0.97 EPS. This compares to last year's loss of $381 million, or -$1.04 EPS. Revenues came in up over 10% at $1.564 billion pro forma basis and more than a 9% rise on an actual basis. First Call had estimates pegged at -$0.75 EPS on $1.55 Billion in revenues. Revenue gains were attributed mostly to increased telephone and high-speed internet revenues. Here were some of the other internal metrics: Revenue generating units...
Wall Street rose modestly in early trading Monday as oil prices ticked lower and the dollar advanced. The market's concerns about rising inflation and its impact on consumer spending... Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 1:41 pm
Oil prices retreated Monday from last week's record close near $126 a barrel as the dollar strengthened against the euro and yen. Light, sweet crude for June delivery dropped $1.32 to... Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 1:41 pm
Falling crude prices helped stocks inch higher Monday morning, but gains were limited as gas prices hit new records and some corporate news from FedEx, MBIA and others disappointed.
Sean Knapp had it made. As a young computer scientist, he couldn't have had a better gig: working at Google, the engineer's paradise. He had all the usual perks - a massage every other week, onsite laundry, free all-you-can-eat haute cuisine. Even better, he got to work on some of Google's highest-profile products, including the search technology that is the heart and soul of the company. And he made full use of his "20% time," that famous one day a week that Google gives its engineers to work on whatever project they want. A little over a year ago he and a couple of colleagues, brothers Bismarck and Belsasar Lepe, ages 28 and 21, respectively, did what many of the young geniuses do at Google: They came up with a cool idea, in this case a new way to handle Web video.
Land of Leather and its chief executive, Paul Briant, today received heavy
fines from the Financial Services Authority (FSA) after inadequately trained
sales staff were allowed to sell payment protection insurance (PPI) on loans. Source: Latest Business News from Times Online | 12 May 2008 | 1:35 pm
Stocks are up modestly in early trading, with a slightly lower price for oil easing some of the market's inflation worries. A barrel of light, sweet crude is down $1.54 at $124.42 a... Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 1:32 pm
Reuters - Cablevision Systems Corp
sealed a $650 million deal to buy 97 percent of Newsday Media
Group from Tribune Co, the companies said on Monday, after
Rupert Murdoch's News Corp (NWSa.N) withdrew its bid.
Cablevision buys US paper Newsday for $650m, after Rupert Murdoch's News Corp withdraws its bid. Source: BBC News | Business | World Edition | 12 May 2008 | 1:31 pm
Sprint Nextel, the struggling third largest US mobile network operator, lost more than 1m subscribers in the first quarter and forecast only marginal improvements in the current quarter.The company, which... Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 1:30 pm
Sprint Nextel, the struggling third largest US mobile network operator, lost more than 1m subscribers in the first quarter and forecast only marginal improvements in the current quarter Source: FT.com - US homepage | 12 May 2008 | 1:30 pm
Westpac Banking said that it was in talks to merge with St. George Bank, a deal that would rank as one of the largest corporate mergers in Australia . Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 1:29 pm
Renault-Nissan and India's Bajaj group said Monday they planned to make a 2,500-dollar car by early 2011, the second effort to make a cheap car for the South Asian nation's rapidly growing... Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 1:26 pm
Britain's trade-in-goods deficit with the rest of the world fell to 7.4 billion pounds in March from 7.6 billion pounds in February, official data showed Monday. The Office... Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 1:25 pm
Fierce clashes involving rockets and heavy machine guns erupted in Lebanon between pro-government forces and opposition gunmen in mountains east of Beirut, killing 36 people Source: FT.com - US homepage | 12 May 2008 | 1:22 pm
The short interest in Sirius (SIRI) inflated by 30.9 million shares to 188.9 million. The figures compare April 30 to April 15 numbers. Investor are clearly willing to gamble against the company's merger with XM Satellite (XMSR). Several banking stocks also say spikes in short interest. Shares sold short in Huntington (HBAN) moved higher by 9.6 million to 47.2 million. Shares short in E*Trade (ETFC) rose 9.2 million to 104.5 million. The short interest in Zions Bancorp (ZION) moved higher by 7.3 million to 23.2 million. Share short in Schwab (SCHW) moved up 6.9 million to 32.1 million. And, the...
The U.S. dollar was mixed against other major currencies in European trading Monday afternoon. Gold rose. The euro traded at $1.5455, down from $1.5480 late Friday in New York. Other Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 1:19 pm
Sofa retailer Land of Leather and its chief executive have been fined by the Financial Services Authority for putting people at risk of being mis-sold Payment Protection Insurance. Source: Telegraph Business | 12 May 2008 | 1:17 pm
Sofa retailer Land of Leather and its chief executive have been fined by the Financial Services Authority for putting people at risk of being mis-sold Payment Protection Insurance. Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 1:17 pm
Europes biggest bank put aside $3.2 billion for bad loans in the United States in the first quarter, in line with its expectations. Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 1:16 pm
Cablevision said it would buy Newsday from the Tribune Company in a deal worth $650m after News Corp dropped out of the running for the Long Island tabloid at the weekend Source: FT.com - US homepage | 12 May 2008 | 1:06 pm
Cablevision on Monday said it would buy Newsday from the Tribune Company in a deal worth $650m after News Corp dropped out of the running for the Long Island tabloid at the weekend. Cablevision will own... Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 1:06 pm
LONDON (Reuters) - Oil fell $2 to near $124 a barrel on Monday, as a stronger U.S. dollar and profit-taking put the brakes on a rally that took it to record peaks last week.
Reuters - Sprint Nextel Corp , the No. 3
U.S. wireless service provider, reported a wider quarterly loss
on Monday on steep customer defections, and forecast only
marginal improvements in the current quarter.
AP - China's inflation rose in April to near decade-high levels, according to data released Monday, increasing pressure on Beijing to cool rapidly ascending prices and avert possible unrest ahead of the Summer Olympics.
US stocks were poised to make slight gains at the opening bell on Monday as oil prices retreated from record highs, the dollar gained strength and investors looked set for a bargain hunt following Friday's... Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 12:54 pm
US stocks made small gains at the opening bell as oil prices retreated from record highs, the dollar gained strength and investors looked set for a bargain hunt following Friday's sharp falls Source: FT.com - US homepage | 12 May 2008 | 12:54 pm
Encana Corporation (NYSE: ECA) has announced that it is splitting the company into two pieces. The plan calls for the company to create an integrated oil company from both upstream and downstream assets, and a natural gas company. Shareholders will receive one share in each of the new companies in exchange for each share of Encana. The natural gas company is expected to retain the Encana name and the combined dividends of the two companies will be set initially to $1.60 annually, equal to the company's current payout. Encana plans to complete the split by early 2009. According to the...
Silver-tongued Raef Bjayou may be one of the favourites to win The Apprentice TV show, but back in the real world of business he has slipped up in rather embarrassing fashion. Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 12:50 pm
Silver-tongued Raef Bjayou may be one of the favourites to win The Apprentice TV show, but back in the real world of business he has slipped up in rather embarrassing fashion. Source: Telegraph Business | 12 May 2008 | 12:50 pm
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Sprint Nextel Corp on Monday reported a wider quarterly loss amid steep customer defections and it forecast only marginal improvements in the current quarter.
IMAX Corporation (NASDAQ: IMAX) is one of the entertainment operations that has been trying to remedy its woes, and its shares at one point were up 100% and more from the 52-week low. This morning the company issued earnings under estimates at -$0.25 EPS on a 12.3% drop in revenues to $23.5 Million. First Call had estimates at -$0.14 EPS on revenues of $25.4 million; and the loss for Q1 2007 was only -$0.12 EPS. IMAX also noted that the seasonally weak quarter faced difficult comparison because of last year's strong IMAX release of 300. Below are some key metrics...
IndyMac Bancorp Inc. said Monday it swung to a loss in the first quarter as deteriorating credit markets forced the mortgage lender to lower the value of mortgage-backed securities, and... Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 12:19 pm
The worrying disclosure in HSBC's first quarter trading update is not the
multi-billion dollar writedowns, which came to $2.6 billion in the
investment banking business and $3.2 billion in HSBC Finance, the US
operations. These are expected and came in lower than some estimates. It is
the bank's downbeat view of the US economy that is of concern.$ Source: Latest Business News from Times Online | 12 May 2008 | 12:13 pm
International Power, the British-based power generator, has bought a range of
power stations in the US are designed to profit from the increasing
shortages of energy in America. Source: Latest Business News from Times Online | 12 May 2008 | 12:13 pm
Oil prices dipped Monday from last week's record highs but held above 125 dollars on tensions in the crude-rich Middle East and ongoing supply fears in Nigeria, traders said. Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 12:08 pm
Because of the rapid pace of technology and the fickle nature of internet users, Facebook's founder, Mark Zuckerberg, needs to lay the foundation for an initial public offering now, before a new flavor-of-the-month social network comes along and makes Facebook look like yesterday's news.
So Zuckerberg is reshaping his management team with experienced corporate hands. In the latest change, Adam D'Angelo, Facebook's 23-year-old chief technical officer, is leaving the inner circle.
D'Angelo, who has known Zuckerberg since high school, is the programming whiz widely credited for building Facebook's technical infrastructure. He follows Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes, who left the company to join Senator Barack Obama's presidential campaign, and Owen Van Natta, the company's former chief operating officer, who left after being demoted to chief revenue officer—a tough job at Facebook, apparently.
D'Angelo's departure comes amid a series of high-profile hires, including new C.O.O. Sheryl Sandberg from Google, who was brought in after a series of Facebook missteps, including the disastrous launch of the Beacon social-advertising platform, which prompted calls for "adult supervision" at the company.
But will new, more experienced management make a difference if the company can't figure out how to make money off its exploding user base?
More than six months after Microsoft injected $240 million into Facebook, Zuckerberg is coming under pressure to justify the $15 billion valuation implied by Microsoft's investment, not to mention the company's rapidly growing head count, this year expected to grow to more than 1,000 employees.
That may be why Facebook failed to raise the full $500 million it had sought in the funding round with Microsoft, instead topping out at about $350 million. But that hasn't kept Facebook from spending—and borrowing—cash: It recently secured a $100 million loan from Silicon Valley startup lender TriplePoint Capital to buy computer servers to handle its exploding user base.
In the beginning, Facebook was a place where college students seeking an alternative to MySpace's wretched interface and spam could congregate online, share photos, gossip, and generally carry on beyond earshot of nosy parents and teachers—not to mention future bosses.
Zuckerberg spoke of highfalutin concepts like the "social graph"—which was supposed to connect everyone in the world into a giant social network.
If Zuckerberg wants to take Facebook public, the time has come to prove that the company is more than just a nifty way for friends to stay in touch, and an actual business with a revenue model that will prove attractive to public markets.
The simple fact is that despite its rapid growth, Facebook has yet to turn a meaningful profit. The company is expected to earn $50 million on $300 million to $350 million in revenue in 2008, but is also expected to spend $200 million on capital expenditures, bringing its "negative cash flow" to $150 million. That's not a good sign for a richly valued company eyeing an I.P.O. in the next year or two.
In recent months it has become increasingly clear that advertising on social networks like Facebook and MySpace is proving to be a trickier proposition than many people had anticipated.
Earlier this year, Google co-founder Sergey Brin acknowledged that his company hasn't found "the killer best way to monetize social networks yet." This is a problem for Google, because it is obligated to pay News Corp., MySpace's owner, $900 million in guaranteed revenue through 2010.
And last week, News Corp. said that selling ads on MySpace is proving to be more difficult than anticipated, which helps explain why Fox Interactive Media's revenues dropped from $233 million to $210 million in the previous quarter.
Part of the problem lies in the fundamental reason why users join online social networks in the first place. Put simply, they're not there to buy things, they're there to socialize.
By contrast, people go to Google, by definition, because they are looking for something. Often, that "something" is a product or service. Thus, by targeting Web advertising to a user's search query, Google has built an enormously profitable business.
This leads to an inherent—if underappreciated—maxim of the internet economy: Not all eyeballs are created equal. Users who visit a site actively looking for something are more valuable to advertisers than users who visit a site to hang out with their friends.
Thus Facebook's watchword is no longer community, but scale, which is why Zuckerberg brought in Sandberg, who built Google's search-advertising business from the ground up. (That business is now responsible for the bulk of the company's $16.6 billion revenue haul.)
Even if Facebook users' eyeballs are less valuable to Web advertisers than Google's, Zuckerberg is hoping that Sandberg can leverage the site's exploding user base (over 100 million globally) to turn a profit.
A congressional proposal to have the government help homeowners refinance mortgages they can no longer afford will only help a small fraction of those who are at risk of losing their homes.
JA Solar Holdings Co. Ltd. (NASDAQ: JASO) came out with earnings this morning of $0.14 EPS vs. First Call estimates of $0.11 on a 234% rise in revenues to $160 million vs. estimates of $147.6 million. The company is also reaffirming an equivalent revenue base of $1.03 to $1.14 Billion, which had previously been estimated at $990 million to $1.10 Billion. First Call had estimates at $989.2 million. JA Solar also reaffirmed its Fiscal-2008 total production output of 340 MW minimum, and it sees a total annual production capacity at a minimum of 500 MW by the end 2008. What...
Reuters - MBIA Inc said on Monday
unrealized losses on insured derivatives skyrocketed in the
first quarter, pushing the world's largest bond insurer into a
sharp quarterly loss. Source: Yahoo! News: Business | 12 May 2008 | 11:51 am
NEW YORK (Reuters) - MBIA Inc said on Monday unrealized losses on insured derivatives skyrocketed in the first quarter, pushing the world's largest bond insurer into a sharp quarterly loss.
European equity markets opened higher on Monday, with luxury goods retailer Hermes leaping on rumours of stakebuilding, while metals groups were boosted by broker comment on steelmaker Salzgitter.By lunchtime,... Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNPaperBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 11:48 am
Chinese inflation rose again last month, defying government hopes and predictions that it had peaked. Source: Telegraph Business | 12 May 2008 | 11:45 am
China's inflation rebounded in April to near decade-high levels, according to data released Monday, increasing pressure on Beijing to cool rapidly ascending prices and avert possible... Source: Infocious RSS raw feed - channel BNewsBusiness | 12 May 2008 | 11:42 am
Applied Materials, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMAT) has announced a contract award for its SunFab Performance Service™ program which would guarantee the performance cost and output of the Applied SunFab™ Thin Film Line. This is for producing solar modules, enabling continuous cost reduction based on megawatt output. Applied signed a multi-year agreement to provide the SunFab Performance Service to T-Solar Global S.A. in Spain for the Applied SunFab Thin Film Line. The SunFab Performance Service allows customers to quickly ramp production and to optimize the efficiency and productivity of their SunFab™ Line. Using 5.7m2 glass panels, the SunFab Line can reduce the...
The government is seeking legal advice over whether it can take action against those behind failed firm Farepak. Source: BBC News | Business | World Edition | 12 May 2008 | 11:34 am
These are ten of the top analyst calls we are seeing this Monday morning: American International Group (NYSE: AIG) Cut to Neutral from Buy at Goldman Sachs. Build-A-Bear Workshop (NYSE: BBW) Cut to Neutral from Outperform at Credit Suisse. Capstone Turbine (NASDAQ: CPST) Started as Buy at Merriman Curhan Ford. Cheniere Energy (AMEX: LNG) Cut to Hold from Buy at Citigroup. Commercial Metals (NYSE: CMC) Started as Buy at UBS. Dollar Tree (NASDAQ: DLTR) Raised to Neutral from Underweight at JP Morgan. ImClone Systems (NASDAQ: IMCL) Cut to Underweight at Morgan Stanley. Pacific Sunwear (NASDAQ: PSUN) Cut to Sell from...
Cablevision owns lucrative, well-managed cable systems in the metropolitan New York region. But its stock is often said to trade at a lower price than it should because of the noncable activities and antics of the company's controlling shareholder, the Dolan family.
The Dolans' latest fancy is the Long Island newspaper Newsday. Cablevision has won the bidding for the paper owned by Sam Zell with a $650 million offer.
"This agreement enables us to maximize the value of Newsday and still retain an interest in this valuable asset," Zell said. Newsday was one of the papers acquired when Zell bought out the Tribune Co. late last year.
Cablevision will hold 97 percent of the Newsday Media Group, which also includes the free paper AM New York, with the Tribune Co. holding 3 percent. The path toward a deal was cleared after Rupert Murdoch withdrew from the bidding on Friday, saying that it had "become uneconomical."
And that is the big question about this deal. There will certainly be talk about finding synergies in Long Island content, but is the price worth buying a delivery system headed for extinction? In 1999, Newsday had a circulation of 574,000. Today it is 380,000 and falling. And its content has suffered from round after round of cutbacks imposed by the Tribune Co.
To pay for this deal, Cablevision is issuing debt of $650 million. Last week, Cablevision agreed to acquire the Sundance Channel for $496 million.
It's hard to see how these deals improve the value of the company's cable operations. And they are limiting Cablevision's ability to do meaningful deals in the near future.
"We've seen this movie before," Craig Moffett, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein & Company, told the New York Times. "Even if you squint hard enough to justify these deals, it isn't what shareholders signed up for."
And if this is a movie, it could be filed under "comedy." There was the satellite project Voom, promoted by Chuck Dolan, but shot down by his son, James. Then there has been the theater of the absurd known as the New York Knicks under Isiah Thomas, whose former, disastrous stewardship is estimated to have cost $187 million.
Indeed some cynics have even suggested only partly in jest that the Dolans are trying to hurt the value of the stock on purpose in order to try again to take the company private. In October, shareholders rejected a $36.26-per-share buyout offer from the Dolans as too low. Since then, however, the stock has fallen to under $25.
Cablevision, however, contends that with Newsday, "the combined company will gain significant opportunities in its advertising-based businesses and subscription-based businesses, while also adding to its content portfolio and enhancing its commitment to the local community," including pooling its news gathering resources and marketing the newspaper through Cablevision.
And analysts see value in the Cablevision franchise. On Friday, Richard Greenfield, an analyst with Pali Research, raised his rating on the company to "neutral" from "sell," reportsBarron's Tech Trader Daily blog.
Cablevision's first-quarter results show "the power of its incredibly high video, data, and voice penetration levels to reduce churn and mitigate marketing cost increases, despite rising competition," he said.
But there are still the Dolans, he notes, who "continue to emphasize their desire to focus on growth strategies—which we essentially view as the Dolans investing in 'passion' projects rather than driving CVC shareholder value."
The credit crunch has so far done few favours to consumers. But it looks as
though the fall-out from the economic turmoil is likely to shield shoppers
from price increases - at least in the short term. Source: Latest Business News from Times Online | 12 May 2008 | 11:25 am
Apple signs deals with four Asia-Pacific mobile phone networks to offer the iPhone in their respective markets. Source: BBC News | Business | World Edition | 12 May 2008 | 11:20 am
Research in Motion, the creator of the BlackBerry, has today launched a
slicker, faster and more powerful version of the businessman's favourite toy
in an apparent attempt to compete with Apple's iPhone. Source: Latest Business News from Times Online | 12 May 2008 | 11:09 am
Centrica, the owner of British Gas, sits between a rock and a hard place.
Every time it raises prices for its millions of domestic gas and electricity
customers it risks a consumer backlash. Source: Latest Business News from Times Online | 12 May 2008 | 11:00 am
The National Association of Pension Funds (NAPF) has teamed up with a private
pension scheme that manages the retirement savings of Ford, Jaguar and Land
Rover workers to bring a £300 million legal challenge against the
Government’s policy of charging VAT on investment management fees. Source: Latest Business News from Times Online | 12 May 2008 | 10:58 am
Reuters - Europe's biggest bank HSBC Holdings
said its profit in the first quarter was ahead of a
year ago as growth in Asia helped counter over $5 billion in
hits from bad debts on U.S. home loans and asset writedowns.
The liquidators of Farepak are suing the company’s former directors over the
high-profile collapse of the Christmas savings club two years ago. Source: Latest Business News from Times Online | 12 May 2008 | 10:47 am
The number of mortgage borrowers with Northern Rock falling behind on
repayments has risen by two thirds in the past four months, the nationalised
bank revealed today. Source: Latest Business News from Times Online | 12 May 2008 | 10:42 am
Oil prices fall, after setting record highs every day last week, and amid concerns that gains may soon return. Source: BBC News | Business | World Edition | 12 May 2008 | 10:18 am
Westpac Banking Corporation, Australia’s oldest company, is in talks with a
smaller rival to create a A$64 billion ($£31 billion) institution with a
customer base equivalent to about half the size of the country’s population. Source: Latest Business News from Times Online | 12 May 2008 | 10:07 am
NEW YORK (Reuters) - International Lease Finance Corp, a unit of American International Group , is worried by the insurer's financial troubles and mulling a split from it, the Wall Street Journal said on Monday, citing people familiar with the matter.
British Gas-owner Centrica signals fuel bills may rise as its profits are squeezed by high gas and power prices. Source: BBC News | Business | World Edition | 12 May 2008 | 10:02 am
UK factory gate prices and producers' input costs rose at a record pace in April, official figures show. Source: BBC News | Business | World Edition | 12 May 2008 | 9:57 am
Renault-Nissan announces a joint venture with Indian firm Bajaj to produce a $2,500 (£1,276) car. Source: BBC News | Business | World Edition | 12 May 2008 | 9:35 am
British Gas insisted today that it had not fully passed on energy price increases to its customers, but gave a thinly veiled warning warned that bills would increase further this year. Source: Telegraph Business | 12 May 2008 | 9:26 am
Britain's biggest bank HSBC has been forced to write down another $3.2bn in the first quarter to cover bad loans in the US and said profit in 2008 is ahead of the same period a year ago. Source: Telegraph Business | 12 May 2008 | 9:15 am
HSBC writes down $3.2bn in the first three months of 2008 as a result of its exposure to the US sub-prime market. Source: BBC News | Business | World Edition | 12 May 2008 | 9:05 am
Oil is the word on everyone's lips at the moment with economists trying to add in the bracing effects of the move from $90 to the current $126. Source: Telegraph Business | 12 May 2008 | 9:01 am
Westpac has made an unsolicited offer to buy St. George Bank Ltd to create Australia's second-largest bank. Source: Telegraph Business | 12 May 2008 | 8:30 am
British Gas insisted today that it had not fully passed on energy price increases to its customers, but gave a thinly veiled warning warned that bills would increase further this year. Source: Telegraph Business | 12 May 2008 | 8:00 am
Australian bank Westpac makes a 15bn Australian dollar (£7.2bn; $14.1bn) offer for its rival St George Bank. Source: BBC News | Business | World Edition | 12 May 2008 | 7:27 am
Germany believes China, India and the US should be forced to adopt higher environmental and health standards if they want to export food products to the European Union, says Horst Seehofer, Germany's farm minister Source: FT.com - US homepage | 12 May 2008 | 7:10 am
Rothschild Worldwide churns out sports fans' headgear to get ahead
At Maggie Rothschild's home office in Sherman Oaks, multicolored wigs rest on Styrofoam heads, mascot toys line the shelves and plush Rally Monkeys dangle from display rods.
What a project is called can make or break it at the box office. Studios mine experts' brains in the quest.
When they met last year with executives at New Line Cinema, marketing consultants Seth Lockhart and Jamil Barrie pitched their 10 favorite alternative titles for "Pride and Glory," a police drama starring Edward Norton and Colin Farrell. Then they passed around a report with dozens of others that didn't make their cut.
Counselors offer valuable lessons as simple as how to use QuickBooks software to as complex as how to do business in China.
Nervously practicing her pitch for hours in her home office, the co-founder of educational toy maker Budding Brilliance Corp. tried not to think about the dollars at stake in her presentation to a group of Tech Coast Angels , an influential Southland organization of wealthy investors.
The weak dollar has increased demand for American goods overseas, but a decline in imports means fewer ships are coming from Asia.
At a time when the struggling U.S. economy needs the biggest boost it can get from booming exports, companies and agricultural producers with American goods bound for overseas can't find enough empty cargo containers and have to wait weeks to get space on ships headed to Asia.
Manufacturers are raising prices as they face the strongest cost pressures in over 20 years, the CBI says. Source: BBC News | Business | World Edition | 12 May 2008 | 6:35 am
Risk aversion and lingering concerns about the local economy resulted in heavy selling of the New Zealand dollar today.
The kiwi dollar slipped to US76.52c at the close, close to its lowest point in three and a half months, against... Source: New Zealand Herald - Business | 12 May 2008 | 5:47 am
Apple is close to announcing it has signed a deal to sell HBO programs and movies on the iTunes website, according to HBO employees involved in executing the agreement.
The deal marks the first time that Apple has agreed to a separate price structure for a content provider, one of the employees said.
The HBO insiders said that the new service would be launched and announced simultaneously, most likely in a week or two.
Details of the agreement are not yet known, but it is clear that HBO was able to secure better terms from Apple than other content providers, they said.
One possibility is that HBO programming will have a higher retail price than the flat $1.99 fee Apple currently charges for video content; another is that HBO will receive a larger cut of the same flat rate than other iTunes content providers receive.
Apple and HBO spokespeople did not return calls for comment on the deal.
NBC pulled its programming from iTunes last summer after Apple refused to charge more than $1.99 for that network's shows. In May, NBC struck a deal with Microsoft to sell its shows on the Zune website.
The HBO-Apple agreement is a strategic coup for both companies. Apple is trying to increase sales and awareness of its new Apple TV, a device that allows viewers to rent movies and buy content from your television. HBO wants to profit from its archive by letting fans buy old episodes of shows like Deadwood and The Larry Sanders Show.
The terms of this new deal could open a Pandora's box for iTunes. With the advent of pricing variation, movie studios and musicians will want to charge more for their big hits. Apple could be pressured to accept variable pricing for other content, a change it has resisted in the past.
HBO started an online download service earlier this year. It lets HBO subscribers watch 400 hours of programming a month and stream HBO's main channel. The service, called HBO on Broadband, is currently being tested in Wisconsin and will soon spread to other markets.
The deal with Apple is a more dramatic move for HBO, since the broadband service only allows current HBO subscribers to access the content. Selling through iTunes would let HBO tap everyone else.
In the past, HBO has been notoriously slow to offer content through new media, and the deal with Apple is a result of pressure from HBO's parent company, Time Warner, according to HBO employees.
Jeff Bewkes took over as Time Warner C.E.O. from Dick Parsons late last year.
"We should have done this a long time ago," said an HBO insider.
Private equity investors target infrastructure projects in effort to buy into sectors unaffected by the credit crisis and the US economic slowdown Source: FT.com - US homepage | 12 May 2008 | 4:38 am
Proposed all-share deal could lead to formation of Australia's biggest bank, with a market value of about A$65bn, and prompt a wider financial services shake-up in the country Source: FT.com - US homepage | 12 May 2008 | 4:26 am
The median house sale price fell 1.1 per cent in April and the volume of sales collapsed 46 per cent from a year ago, the Real Estate Institute of New Zealand (REINZ) said today in its latest monthly report.
The industry body... Source: New Zealand Herald - Business | 12 May 2008 | 4:07 am
It's the media - not the economic cycle or high interest rates driving down house prices, say real estate agents.
Alistair Helm, the chief executive of realestate.co.nz, - the website owned by the major agents, says media stories... Source: New Zealand Herald - Business | 11 May 2008 | 11:30 pm
The sharemarket started the week looking soft, in the wake of record oil prices, falls in United States equities and a sliding New Zealand dollar.
The market was led down by Fletcher Building, which shed 11c early to 818, while... Source: New Zealand Herald - Business | 11 May 2008 | 10:48 pm
Contact Energy shareholders have been told that if the UK company trying to take over Origin Energy is successful, then they too will be offered cash for their shares.
Britain's BG Group is launching a $A12.9 billion ($NZ15.96... Source: New Zealand Herald - Business | 11 May 2008 | 10:10 pm
Westpac Banking Corp Ltd, Australia's fourth-biggest lender, said it is in talks on an all-share bid for St George Bank Ltd, which has a market value of A$15 billion ($18.6 billion), to create Australia's largest home lending and... Source: New Zealand Herald - Business | 11 May 2008 | 9:30 pm
Fisher & Paykel has stepped onto a marketing tightrope, rebranding a big part of its New Zealand output as "Elba" while preserving the old Fisher & Paykel brand for top-end products.
Those products - including top-of-the-line washing... Source: New Zealand Herald - Business | 11 May 2008 | 7:20 pm
Deep in the Waikato, a 3m gas flare is a beacon for what could be a big part of New Zealand's energy future.
Coal seam gas (CSG) now being appraised in test wells west of Huntly could, if commercially viable on a wide scale, provide... Source: New Zealand Herald - Business | 11 May 2008 | 7:00 pm
Carter Holt Harvey has agreed to buy the timber manufacturing and distribution businesses of Australia's Weyerhaeuser Australian Group.
The deal includes its interest in Green Triangle Forest Products Group in Victoria.
The... Source: New Zealand Herald - Business | 11 May 2008 | 6:50 pm
The challenge of choosing which KiwiSaver fund to invest with may be about to get a little bit easier.
The NZX is launching a revamped website on May 28 including a KiwiSaver section devoted to rating the different funds.
The... Source: New Zealand Herald - Business | 11 May 2008 | 6:40 pm
Reuters - The scheduled start on Monday of a
trial over financing for the $20 billion buyout of Clear
Channel Communications has been delayed until Tuesday.
Reuters - Stocks were little changed on Monday
as the dollar's rise helped to push oil prices lower, but gains
were offset after Fedex Corp, a package delivery company seen
as a barometer of economic activity, slashed its earnings
forecast.
Reuters - Cablevision Systems Corp
sealed a $650 million deal to buy 97 percent of Newsday Media
Group from Tribune Co, the companies said on Monday, after
Rupert Murdoch's News Corp (NWSa.N) withdrew its bid.
Reuters - Sprint Nextel Corp , the No. 3
U.S. wireless service provider, reported a wider quarterly loss
on Monday on steep customer defections, and forecast only
marginal improvements in the current quarter.
AP - China's inflation rose in April to near decade-high levels, according to data released Monday, increasing pressure on Beijing to cool rapidly ascending prices and avert possible unrest ahead of the Summer Olympics.
Reuters - Europe's biggest bank HSBC Holdings
said its profit in the first quarter was ahead of a
year ago as growth in Asia helped counter over $5 billion in
hits from bad debts on U.S. home loans and asset writedowns.