Today's Headlines

Bloomberg:
- Emerging-market stocks dropped as the conflict between Israel and Lebanon entered its sixth day and traders sought to reduce exposure to the riskiest stocks.
- The dollar surged to the highest in almost three months against the yen and strengthened versus the euro as investors sought a haven from escalating violence in the Middle East.
- Bill Gross, manager of the world’s biggest bond fund, raised holdings of US Treasuries and agency debt in June after cutting the category for seven straight months to a four-year low.
- Natural Gas in NY had its biggest plunge in almost six months as plentiful inventories tempered concern about hot weather in the northern US.
- Crude oil closed floor-trading down almost $2/bbl. as speculators took profits and Middle Eastern tensions eased slightly.

Wall Street Journal:
- Esmark Inc., the closely held steel distributor, plans to start a proxy fight as early as today for control of Wheeling-Pittsburgh(WPSC) as part of a bid to combine the two companies.
- Intel Corp.(INTC) plans to introduce tomorrow the first in its line of Itanium chips containing the equivalent of two electronic brains on a single piece of silicon.
- Federated Dept. Stores(FD) CEO Lundgren is betting that he can turn around a 20-year decline in US department-store sales by creating the industry’s first nationwide chain.

LA Times:
- News Corp.(NWS) Chairman Murdoch may be close to a deal to buy EchoStar Communications(DISH), citing unidentified money managers attending Allen & Co.’s conference in Silicon Valley.

Washington Post:
- Democracy Alliance, a coalition of almost a hundred of the US’s richest donors, has given more than $50 million to liberal think tanks and advocacy groups in the last nine months to compete against conservatives. The group was formed last year with backing from billionaires including George Soros and Colorado software entrepreneur Tim Gill. The donations have made some Democratic groups uncomfortable because the alliance requires that groups agree to protect the identity of donors.

NY Times:
- About $10 billion in US aid is starting to reach people in Mississippi and Louisiana who lost their homes in last year’s hurricanes, an unprecedented level of direct assistance to homeowners.
- CBS Corp.(CBS) will advertise its fall television shows on eggshells.

Financial Times Deutschland:
- Delta Air Lines is under time pressure to buy or lease more planes by the end of this decade to replace aircraft going out of commission, COO Whitehurst said.