Every morning the Street of Walls team puts out an update on market levels, today’s top stories, and active M&A deals.
Today’s Top Stories:
- GS Morning Update: “Asian Markets were mostly higher Tuesday as stocks in Hong Kong, in particular, rebounded from Monday’s weak showing. Investors continue to position around comments from European leaders and policy makers regarding progress on talks to resolve the region’s debt crisis. Investors are also positioning ahead of a very busy week of data set to kick off tonight with the monthly manufacturing PMI survey from China” (GS)
- AAPL at $500: WSJ article that says if deal w/ CHL reached, the stock will rise above $500 next year
- RadioShack Big Miss: RSH down -25% negative pre-announcement, suspends buyback
- CS Product Marketing: “We have re-polled our panel of over 100 corporates in Europe and the US to analyze their spending plans. The key theme that emerges is a distinct improvement in the spending plans of US corporates while the Europeans lag. In January, the responses from our survey still remain weak though not dramatically worsening. Tech was the area to see a significant slippage” (CS)
- PE Firms Jumping in Housing Market: Bloomberg discusses how PE firms are buying distressed homes in bulk as Washington prepares to market some ~200K foreclosed properties sitting on the balance sheet of Fannie and Freddie (BBG)
- “Buffett Rule” Coming: Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse plans to introduce legislation this week that would require millionaires to pay at least a 30% tax rate http://bit.ly/zIyDSL
- RBS Having Trouble Selling: company is finding it hard to sell its cash equities business; finding buyers for those units is proving to be tougher than originally envisioned as rivals shrink themselves (Reuters)
- Marathon Adds ULTR: After market close yesterday, Marathon Asset Management increased its stake in Ultrapetrol (Bahamas) Ltd. (Nasdaq:ULTR) to 6.73% of the company’s outstanding common shareshttp://bit.ly/ydTFwG
M&A Watch:
- Weekly M&A Trends: Completed M&A volumes rose by 10% in the week to $25.0 billion http://bit.ly/yLnba7