Thursday, November 03, 2005

Friday Watch

Late-Night Headlines
Bloomberg:
- Amazon.com plans to sell online access to any page or section of a book, as well as its entirety. Random House said it’s developing a similar service and may participate in Amazon’s program.
- Shares of BlueScope Steel Ltd. had their biggest-ever slump after Australia’s biggest steelmaker said profit may fall as much as 38% as rising inventories curb prices. Steel prices may fall as much as 27% next year as rising Chinese output causes a glut, ABN Amro analyst Michael Sones said.

Financial Times:
- Microsoft has agreed to a deal with the British Library to make digital copies of 25 million pages of material, including books, journals, maps and manuscripts, available on the Internet.

AFP:
- Riots broke out for the eighth consecutive night in the suburbs of Paris. The violence was most severe in the north-eastern Seine-Saint-Denis area, where 1,300 police officers were deployed. Over 40 vehicles were set alight and shots were fired at police.

Late Buy/Sell Recommendations
Goldman Sachs:
- Reiterated Outperform on LVS, WON and SBUX.
- Reiterated Underperform on ABC, FTO and CSC.

Business Week:
- Drugmaker Wyeth(WYE) is an attractive takeover target because it would help a larger rival expand its biological drug business.
- Shares of Ethan Allen Interiors(ETH) may decline as the furniture designer and marker’s growth is threatened by low-cost, high-quality imports.

Night Trading
Asian Indices are unch. to +.75% on average.
S&P 500 indicated -.10%.
NASDAQ 100 indicated -.12%.

Morning Preview
US AM Market Call
NASDAQ 100 Pre-Market Indicator/Heat Map
Pre-market Commentary
Before the Bell CNBC Video(bottom right)
Global Commentary
Asian Indices
European Indices
Top 20 Business Stories
In Play
Bond Ticker
Daily Stock Events
Macro Calls
Rasmussen Consumer/Investor Daily Indices
CNBC Guest Schedule

Earnings of Note
Company/EPS Estimate
FO/1.12
GDT/.49
NBL/1.18
RL/.90
PWR/.07

Upcoming Splits
- None of note

Economic Releases
8:30 am EST
- The Change in Non-farm Payrolls for October is estimated at 120K versus -27K in September.
- The Change in Manufacturing Payrolls for October is estimated at -9K versus -27K in September.
- The Unemployment Rate for October is estimated at 5.1% versus 5.1% in September.
- Average Hourly Earnings for October is estimated to rise .2% versus a .2% gain in September.

BOTTOM LINE: Asian indices are mostly higher, led by Japan as the Nikkei 225 broke 14,000 for the first time in more than four years. I expect US equities to open modestly higher on a better-than-expected employment report. The Portfolio is 100% net long heading into the day.

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