Latest News In Stock Market Investment Research – Feb 20, 2009

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Wellcare to suspend enrollment in Medicare plans

20 Feb 2009 at 4:56am

LONDON (MarketWatch) — WellCare Health Plans Inc. said Friday that it will suspend marketing of, and enrollment into, its Medicare health plans by March 7 after the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services imposed sanctions on its Medicare Advantage plans and Medicare Prescription Drug Plans. WellCare said it is making “significant efforts” to improve operational effectiveness to address the issues raised and will engage independent third parties to ensure all its operations and marketing activities are compliant with CMS requirements. It added current members of its Medicare health plans will not be affected and the action also doesn’t affect its Medicaid and S-CHIP plans.

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Germany denies rescue plan in works for troubled euro states

20 Feb 2009 at 4:40am

LONDON (MarketWatch) — The German Finance Ministry on Friday denied a report in weekly magazine Der Spiegel that it is weighing plans for a coordinated rescue of financially distressed euro-zone countries. “The Spiegel report doesn’t correspond with the facts. The Federal Finance Ministry isn’t working on any such concepts,” said finance ministry spokeswoman Jeanette Schwamberger in Berlin, according to Dow Jones Newswires. The spokeswoman said Germany has “no doubt about the unity of the monetary union,” but that rising bond yield spreads within the euro zone warrant “joint action by the European Commission, European Central Bank” and euro-zone finance ministers “to discuss measures with the affected member states to reverse this development.”

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Gold futures catch a bid as stock futures fall

20 Feb 2009 at 4:31am

LONDON (MarketWatch) — Gold futures advanced Friday morning, responding to a sell-off in U.S. stock futures and international stock markets. Trading as high as $988.40 an ounce, gold futures at 6:30 a.m. Eastern were up $10.90 to $987.40 an ounce. “The price slide of U.S. equities, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average falling to its lowest level since October 2002, should result in a continued positive mood of investors on gold,” said Eugen Weinberg, an analyst at Commerzbank.

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Axa shares drop in Paris, Standard & Poor’s cuts outlook

20 Feb 2009 at 4:11am

LONDON (MarketWatch) — Shares of French insurance firm Axa fell 14% in Paris on Friday. Ratings agency Standard & Poor’s cut its outlook for the firm to negative and said it expects a material decline in profits at the insurer. Axa shares fell sharply on Thursday when it reported results.

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CV Therapeutics rejects Astellas bid as loss widens

20 Feb 2009 at 3:56am

LONDON (MarketWatch) — CV Therapeutics Inc. said Friday that its board of directors has rejected the previously announced $1 billion, or $16-a-share takeover bid from Astellas Pharma Inc. . CV Therapeutics said that its board concluded the offer “significantly undervalues the company” and isn’t in the best interests of shareholders. It added the board had previously rejected the same proposal in November when Astellas approached it privately. Separately CV Therapeutics announced that its fourth-quarter net loss widened to $37 million, or 60 cents a share, from $34.1 million, or 57 cents a share, a year earlier. Revenue for the quarter rose 87% to $41.9 million. Analysts polled by FactSet had been expecting a loss of 35 cents a share in the latest quarter.

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Germany weighs rescue plan for euro-zone states: report

20 Feb 2009 at 3:29am

LONDON (MarketWatch) — The German Finance Ministry is pondering measures to aid euro-zone countries facing severe financial strains, the German weekly magazine Der Spiegel reported Friday. One option would be for countries facing insolvency to issue a bilateral bond, with a creditworthy country taking the loan and providing it to the distressed country. Another option would be a joint bond issued by creditworthy countries, as well as a rescue package led by the European Union. German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck this week said suggestions financial strains could lead to a country exiting the euro zone were “absurd” and that governments were ready to provide support to troubled euro-zone members if needed.

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U.K. January retail sales stronger than expected

20 Feb 2009 at 3:04am

LONDON (MarketWatch) — British retail sales rose at an unexpectedly strong pace in January, the Office for National Statistics reported Friday. Sales saw a monthly rise of 0.7%, for a year-on-year rise of 3.6%. Economists had forecast a 0.2% monthly rise and a 2.5% annual jump.

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GM’s Saab unit files for creditor protection

20 Feb 2009 at 2:28am

STOCKHOLM (MarketWatch) — Saab Automobile AB, General Motors Corp.’s loss-making Swedish unit, said Friday it is applying for reorganization with a Swedish court. Saab said it hopes the court process will permit it to reorganize itself “into a fully independent business.” “Pending court approval, the reorganization will be executed over a three-month period and will require independent funding to succeed,” it said. It said it will seek funding from both private and public sources, and that it will present its reorganization proposal to creditors within three weeks.

Market Pulse Stories are Rapid-fire, short news bursts on stocks and markets as they move. Visit MarketWatch.com for more information on this news.

Euro-zone PMI readings signal record February contraction

20 Feb 2009 at 2:10am

LONDON (MarketWatch) — Purchasing managers indexes for the manufacturing and services sectors signal activity contracted at a record pace across the euro zone in February. The preliminary Markit euro-zone manufacturing purchasing managers index fell to a record low of 33.6 in February from 34.4 in January, defying forecasts for a rise to 35. Services PMI fell to a record low of 38.9 from 42.2 in January. The figure was expected to rise to 42.5. The euro-zone composite PMI reading dropped to a record low of 36.2 from 38.3 in January. It had been forecast to rise to 38.7. A figure of less than 50 signals that a majority of purchasing managers saw a contraction in activity, while a figure of more than 50 indicates expansion.

Market Pulse Stories are Rapid-fire, short news bursts on stocks and markets as they move. Visit MarketWatch.com for more information on this news.

Credit Suisse says Macau travel-visa lobby effort positive

20 Feb 2009 at 1:52am

HONG KONG (MarketWatch)– Credit Suisse says it is cautiously optimistic on a plan by Macau and its neighbors to jointly lobby Beijing to loosen travel restrictions on mainland residents seeking to visit the gambling enclave. News of the plan was reported by the Chinese-language Hong Kong Economic Times. One proposal being considered could see travel restrictions loosened on 95 million residents of Guangdong under a one-year multi-entry visa scheme. Only a small parentage of the people who live there now have access under a multi-entry scheme. “We view this is an incremental positive for Macau but remain cautious in the short term as this proposal still requires formal approval which would take time,” said Credit Suisse analysts headed by Anil Daswani in a note Friday. Credit Suisse said it maintained its recommendation that investors should buy shares of Hong Kong-listed casino operator Melco .

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Bank of America’s Lewis subpoenaed over Merrill deal: WSJ

20 Feb 2009 at 1:38am

LONDON (MarketWatch) — Bank of America Corp. Chairman and CEO Kenneth Lewis has been subpoenaed by New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, who is investigating whether the bank withheld information from investors, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal citing people familiar with the matter. Cuomo is investigating the bank’s purchase of Merrill Lynch & Co. to determine whether investors were misled about the depth of Merrill’s losses in late 2008 and whether details of the bonuses to Merrill employees should have been disclosed, the report said. Investigators also took testimony from John Thain, the former CEO of Merrill, on Thursday, the Journal reported. Thain was quizzed on why the September agreement contained a nonpublic attachment that detailed the maximum Merrill could pay in bonuses, the report added.

Market Pulse Stories are Rapid-fire, short news bursts on stocks and markets as they move. Visit MarketWatch.com for more information on this news.

Saint-Gobain drops after rights issue

20 Feb 2009 at 1:21am

LONDON (MarketWatch) — Shares in French building materials group Compagnie de Sant-Gobain fell around 11% in early Paris trading Friday after the firm said it would raise 1.5 billion euros ($1.9 billion) in a rights issue to strengthen its finances as the construction market continues to slow. The group also announced a 7.3% drop in net profit for 2008 to 1.38 billion euros as sales edged up 0.9% to 43.8 billion euros. Saint Gobain said it cut 8,000 jobs in 2008, resulting in 400 million euros of cost savings and added it plans to cut costs by a further 600 million euros in 2009. Any acquisition projects will be put on hold in 2009 , the group said, adding that it will pay a dividend of 1 euro a share.

Market Pulse Stories are Rapid-fire, short news bursts on stocks and markets as they move. Visit MarketWatch.com for more information on this news.

European shares drop sharply in early trading

20 Feb 2009 at 1:09am

LONDON (MarketWatch) — European shares fell at the open on Friday, with financials such as BNP Paribas , down 4.7%, and oil producers such as BP , down 2.1%, dragging the market down. Financials fronted losses for U.S. shares on Thursday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average hitting a six-year low. Elsewhere, construction firm Saint Gobain dropped 13.4% after updating investors, while insurer Prudential climbed 5.1%. The U.K. FTSE 100 index dropped 1.7% to 3,951.76, the German DAX 30 index fell 2.5% to 4,109.85 and the French CAC-40 index lost 2.5% to 2,80.01.

Market Pulse Stories are Rapid-fire, short news bursts on stocks and markets as they move. Visit MarketWatch.com for more information on this news.

Colt Telecom to issue shares, quarterly profit drops 17%

20 Feb 2009 at 12:41am

LONDON (MarketWatch) — Colt Telecom said Friday that it will issue 211 million shares to raise 178.3 million pounds. Separately, the firm said that its fourth-quarter net profit fell to 11.2 million euros, from 13.5 million euros at the same point a year ago. Revenue increased to 427.5 million euros, from 424.6 million euros. Colt said that it has not experienced any material change in the performance trend of its business since the end of 2008. However, the ongoing uncertainty in the global economy, means that 2009 revenues are difficult to predict.

Market Pulse Stories are Rapid-fire, short news bursts on stocks and markets as they move. Visit MarketWatch.com for more information on this news.

Cattles warns on profit, delays results

20 Feb 2009 at 12:39am

LONDON (MarketWatch) — U.K. subprime lender Cattles warned Friday that its pretax profit is expected to be “substantially lower” than current market expectations. The group said it is delaying the release of its 2008 preliminary results while it reviews the adequacy of the impairment provisions it has taken and a new date for the results will be announced in due course.

Market Pulse Stories are Rapid-fire, short news bursts on stocks and markets as they move. Visit MarketWatch.com for more information on this news.

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February 20 2009 04:10 am | Stock Market News

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