Thursday, February 26, 2015

Wall Street Breakfast: Net Neutrality To Sweep The Nation?

 |  179 comments  |  Includes: BAC, CRM, GME, GOOG, GOOGL, GSK, IBDRY, JPM, LNV

Economy
The FCC is expected to approve Chairman Tom Wheeler's proposed "net neutrality" rules today, which will regulate broadband providers more heavily than in the past and restrict their power to control download speeds on the web. The vote comes after a year of jostling between net neutrality advocates and cable and telecom companies, which are expected to launch a volley of lawsuits should the new rules be passed.
The ECB is willing to again accept Greek bonds for funding if Athens keeps to reform pledges, announced Mario Draghi, defending the euro zone central bank's treatment of Greece. "We are ready to reinstate the waiver as soon as the Governing Council will decide that the conditions for a successful completion of the program are in place," Draghi said. Greek banks have been relying on emergency liquidity assistance since the ECB lifted the waiver on February 4.
Cuba and the U.S. will meet for a second round of diplomatic talks on Friday, indicating that the process of normalizing relations is moving ahead. The new round in Washington will focus on issues related to establishing full-fledged embassies, the movement of diplomats, visas and access to equipment and banking. Closed-end Caribbean Basin Fund CUBA has soared over 27%since the two announced plans of restoring diplomatic ties on December 17, 2014.
Stocks
Salesforce.com +11.4% premarket after reporting fourth-quarter earnings and revenue that met analyst expectations and strong growth in deferred sales. Adjusted earnings per share of $0.14 on revenue of $1.44B exactly met average estimates, and deferred revenue rose 32%. Salesforce's (NYSE:CRM) guidance for fiscal 2016 came in better-than-feared, but was still slightly lighter than Wall Street predictions.
Samsung Electronics has decided to freeze paychecks for its employees this year, as the tech giant struggles amid a slump in profits, heavy competition and a weak Japanese yen, South Korea's Yonhap news agency reports. The move marks the first time since 2009 that the company has frozen paychecks for all its workers. Samsung's (OTC:SSNLF) net profit fell sharply in 2014, dropping 23.2% to 23.4T won ($21.2B) from 30.5T won the previous year.
Just a week after apologizing for bundling computers with an encryption-breaking adware program known as Superfish, Lenovo (OTCPK:LNVGY) said a cyberattack had taken down its website on Thursday, although it was not clear who was behind the breach. Hacker group Lizard Squad, which has taken credit for several recent high-profile outages, including Sony's (NYSE:SNE) PlayStation Network and Microsoft's (NASDAQ:MSFT) Xbox Live, has claimed responsibility for the attack.
Google is unifying its two separate European arms to meet the challenges of a more combative regulatory landscape on the continent, FT reports. The rethink reflects governmental and legal pressure over its activities in several individual countries, including the U.K., Germany, France, Belgium and Spain. A separate report by the WSJ, suggests that YouTube still has not become a profitable business. Despite accounting for 6% of Google’s (GOOG, GOOGL) overall sales last year, it didn’t contribute anything to earnings.
Spanish utility Iberdrola has agreed to buy UIL Holdings (NYSE:UIL) for about $3B, creating a new listed power and electric utility. Iberdrola (OTCPK:IBDRY) said the deal would help implement its growth plans in the U.S. through 2016, as it seeks to expand its footprint outside its sluggish home market. The deal values each share of UIL at $52.83, representing a 23.6% premium over its closing price on Wednesday.
Recovering from earlier losses, Transocean (NYSE:RIG) is now up 8.4%premarket as investors turn to the offshore oil driller's smashed consensus revenue and EPS estimates. Despite a $992M impairment charge that did away with the remaining goodwill on the company's balance sheet, adjusted profit came in at $0.95 a share, up from $0.71 a share a year earlier. Options traders were betting on a big one-day, post-results move of about 7.5% in either direction, according to FactSet.
RadioShack has received approval from a U.S. Bankruptcy Court judge to auction off about 2,000 of its stores with an initial $200M bid from hedge fund Standard General. Standard is planning to keep about half of the company's stores open and operate them under an agreement with Sprint (NYSE:S). RadioShack (NYSE:RSH) lawyers also said the company received bids for leases to 205 of the 1,100 locations it plans to close this month, including interest from a unit of GameStop (NYSE:GME).
Posting its seventh straight annual loss, Royal Bank of Scotland (NYSE:RBS) reported a £3.47B net loss for 2014 after booking a £4B writedown on the value of U.S. offshoot Citizens. The bank also named Howard Davies as chairman. Davies, the former head of the now-defunct Financial Services Authority, succeeds Philip Hampton, who is to replace Christopher Gent as chairman of GlaxoSmithKline (NYSE:GSK).
Standard Chartered said former JPMorgan (NYSE:JPM) investment bank boss Bill Winters will take over as chief executive in June to replace Peter Sands, after investors demanded a change in leadership following problems ranging from a U.S. fine for breaking sanctions to a jump in losses from commodities loans. StanChart (OTCPK:SCBFF) also announced that Chairman John Peace will leave next year, and named other changes to its board in a massive management overhaul.


Morgan Stanley has reached a $2.6B settlement with the U.S. Justice Department over the sale of mortgage securities before the financial crisis. Other large banks have already struck similar settlements, with BofA (NYSE:BAC) agreeing to pay a record $16.7B last year and JPMorgan (JPM) settling for $13B in 2013. The $2.6B price tag will more than wipe out the $1B in quarterly profits that the firm had announced last month. MS -0.4%premarket.

Today's Markets:
In Asia, Japan +1.1% to 18786. Hong Kong +0.5% to 24902. China +2.2%to 3298. India -0.9% to 28747.
In Europe, at midday, London flat. Paris +0.3%. Frankfurt +0.2%.
Futures at 6:20: Dow +0.1%. S&P +0.1%. Nasdaq +0.2%. Crude -1.6% to $50.20. Gold +1.4% to $1217.90.
Ten-year Treasury Yield -1 bps to 1.96%
Notable earnings before today's open: ACIW, ACTA, AES, AKRX, AMCX,AMWD, ANSS, ARCC, BDBD, BIN, BUD, CCG, CHS, CNP, CNSL, CRI, CWEI,CYBX, DDD, EME, EXH, EXLP, FCH, FIG, FRO, GCAP, GOGO, HAWK, HEES,HSC, HSNI, ICON, IQNT, IRDM, ITC, KOP, KSS, LKQ, LPI, LTM, MBLY, MDXG,MGLN, MITL, MRGE, NTI, NTLS, NXST, NXTM, OGE, ONE, RHP, SDRL, SEAS,SFY, SHLD, SNAK, SNH, SNMX, SRE, SRPT, TASR, TD, TICC, TWI, VAC, VC,VICL, WAC, WNR, XCRA, ZEUS
Notable earnings after today's close: ABTL, ADSK, AEGR, AHT, AIRM, AL,APEI, ARUN, AVD, BCEI, BIO, BLOX, CERS, CLNE, CROX, CSU, CUBE, DGI,ECOL, ECPG, ENOC, ENV, EVC, EVHC, GPS, HLF, HPTX, IM, IMMR, JCP, KBR,KND, LYV, MAIN, MDRX, MENT, MITT, MNST, MTZ, MVNR, NMBL, NOG, NVAX,OLED, OUT, OVTI, PE, PEGA, PFMT, PKT, PODD, PSIX, RBA, RMTI, ROST, RP,RPTP, RRMS, SB, SBAC, SEMG, SGM, SPLK, SRC, SREV, SWN, SZYM, TPC,TUBE, TUMI, TWOU, UHS, UIL, UNXL, VGR, WIFI, WTR, WTW
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