Today's Headlines

Bloomberg:
- US financial and real estate companies are at “attractive valuations” after their shares fell on the subprime mortgage crisis, said David Jackson, chief executive officer of Dubai-owned investment firm Istithmar PJSC.
- The tumor in the financial markets known as structured investment vehicles is shrinking, reducing the urgency for a bailout sponsored by the US Treasury.
- Sales of collateralized loan obligations, the source of funding that helped drive leveraged buyouts to a record earlier this year, rose 17% last month, according to Morgan Stanley analysts.
- General Electric(GE) received a contract valued at about $650 million to provide 333 wind turbines to Noble Environmental Power for new and expansion projects in NY and Texas.
- China, the world’s biggest pork consumer, will lift a ban on shipments from six US pork processing facilities as part of measures aimed at reducing the country’s record trade surplus.
- Crude oil rose more than $1/bbl. on speculation the US Fed will lower interest rates, bolstering demand in the world’s largest energy consumer.
- Wheat fell the most in two weeks on speculation that high prices will curb demand for US supplies.
- Commodity index returns may decline next year as a slowing US economy crimps demand for energy and metals, according to Commerzbank AG.
- Two suicide bombings blamed on an al-Qaeda group rocked the Algerian capital, killing as many as 62 people in the worst attack since Islamist massacres in the 1990s.
- A majority of New Jersey voters oppose a proposal to eliminate the state’s death penalty, which narrowly passed the Senate yesterday and will be considered by the Assembly later this week. A repeal measure is opposed by a 53% to 39% margin, according to a Quinnipiac University poll.
- It seems like old times at AT&T(T). The largest US phone company announced a $15.2 billion stock buyback today and raised its dividend 13%, the largest increase in AT&T history. The shares climbed the most in almost five years.
- Synchronoss Technologies(SNCR), whose software activates Apple’s(AAPL) iPhone, surged as much as 12% in Nasdaq Stock Market trading after announcing a contract with Sprint Nextel(S).
- ArvinMeritor Inc.(ARM), a US maker of shock absorbers and brakes for commercial trucks, jumped as much as 12% after the company affirmed its 2008 profit forecast.
- Sony Corp.(SNE) CEO Stringer plans to connect the company’s flagship PlayStation 3 console with its other electronics as part of its growth strategy next year and beyond.
- DuPont Co.(DD) CEO Holliday said the US economy will avoid a recession in 2008, buoyed by services and commercial construction as well as falling oil prices.
- Libya has set aside $100 billion to buy foreign assets, joining a group of oil-rich Arab states led by the United Arab Emirates that is searching for investment opportunities around the world.
- Merck(MRK) plans to seek regulatory approval next year for a new obesity treatment and begin selling a medicine for raising levels of good cholesterol.

Wall Street Journal:
- Democrats are rethinking their year-end budget strategy amid anger over White House veto threats and recriminations within the party over the suggestion that Congress is trading on the Iraq war to gain leverage for domestic spending.

NY Post:
- Facing a severe ratings decline and disgruntled advertisers, NBC is taking the unusual step of offering cash back – rather than additional ad time – to compensate for the shortfall.

Handelsblatt:
- UBS AG CEO Marcel Rohner said it’s “hard to imagine” a further loss after the Swiss bank wrote down US

subprime mortgage investments by $10 billion.