Market Gazer Hong Kong - Japan - Germany - UK - North America
market review : Europe & US
It was a quiet Monday in Europe and US
on the economic front, but in terms of
financial deals, the day featured three
deals involving Wal-Mart, Unilever and
IBM, General Electric, Southwest Airlines,
as well as Coca-Cola. The stock indexes
however, ended down in both continents
as the stocks took a pause after a sizzling
rally on Friday. DAX index slipped 19.41
points or 0.31%, FTSE 100 index was down
25.06 points to 0.45%, while Dow Jones
Industrial Average dropped 48.22 points
to end at 10,812.04. Nasdaq ended at
2,369.77, dropping 11.45 points or 0.48%,
S&P 500 index declined 6.51 points to
1,142.16.
The retail giant Wal-Mart
has announced its bid for
Massmart Holdings, a
South African retailer for $4.26 billion. The
move showed Wal-Mart’s ambition to
expand its market towards Africa. So far in
1H 2010, Massmart booked a net income
of 1.21 billion rand, 5.4% lower than the
same period a year before. Revenue was
47.55 billion rand, or 10% higher from last
year. Wal-Mart bid equaled to 148 rand
per share or $21.13 per share, a nearly
10% of premium. Although the proposed
deal could bring a lot of potential to Wal-
Mart, some analysts warned that this may
not be achieved easily as Wal-Mart lacked
the presence in Africa and that it would
mean more time to bring synergy to the
both companies. Massmart itself traded at
134.75 rand, while Wal-Mart declined
1.1% to $53.48.
27 September 2010
Unilever Plc set its
sights at Alberto
Culver, a hair-products
firm from US. The
consumer goods giant
offered a bid of $3.7
billion, or $37.50 per share, a 33%
premium to Alberto Culver’s 12-month
average price. Similar to Wal-Mart,
Unilever will bolster its influence in the
American markets should the deal
proceeds smoothly. Throughout the full
year ending June 2010, Alberto Culver
achieved a sales of $1.6 billion. Unilever
shares ended at 1,816 pence, or up 1.28%.
In the tech sector, IBM said that it would
buy a data center switches company,
Blade. No details of the deal was
disclosed. Blade would be the next
company for IBM to add after last week’s
deal on Netezza Corp. IBM inched 0.4%
higher to $134.65.
After Samsung’s
GalaxyTab, Apple’s
iPad will have a new
competitor in the
tablet computer
market: RIM’s PlayBook. The news came
after the closing bell, so the impact would
be seen in the after hours trade at the
soonest where at the moment the shares
trade at $49.04, up 1.41% after it settled
at $48.36 or down 1.04% by the end of
Monday’s closing bell. Apple’s shares
ended at $291.16 or down 0.4% but
dropped further to $290.80 or another
0.12% during the extended hours trade.
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 Market Gazer Hong Kong - Japan - Germany - UK - North America
US Federal Trade Commission and Canada
Competition Bureau have approved Coca-
Cola’s bid to buy its North American
bottler operation. The bid was submitted
back in February and have been agreed on
the condition that Coca-Cola would keep
Dr Pepper Snapple Group’s business
information confidential. Coke’s bottling
operation also bottles and distributes Dr
Pepper Snapple other than Coca-Cola.
Coke’s shares ended at $58.60 or down
slightly by 0.03%.
General Electric has bought
20% of Vivendi’s stakes at
NBC Universal for $2 billion.
The other 12.34% will also be
sold later to GE for $3.8 billion. Vivendi
planned to use the cash obtained from
the sales of its stakes at NBC to purchase
the entire SFR, a telecom operator. GE
declined 1.38% to $16.43.
Southwest Airlines also spent $1.4 billion
to buy AirTran Holdings, Inc. The deal will
expand Southwest’s operation to Atlanta.
At $7.69 per share, the deal represented a
premium of 69%, and will boost
Southwest’s revenue by $2 billion
annually. Southwest’s shares jumped
8.71% to $13.35.
Siemens AG saw a better fiscal 4Q where
orders were expected to hit €20.1 billion
and that the firm would make more than
€18.9 billion of revenue. While the
company’s energy unit and the secotr’s
profit would be better than a year ago,
health-care unit profit will be lower than
27 September 2010
last year’s €483 million. Equity
investments unit would also be a drag to
Siemens as the unit produced negative
results. Siemens tumbled 1.82% to
€77.84.
Saab Automobile will be using engines
from BMW for the 9-3 model to be
released in 2012. BMW will also sell its
diesel engines to Saab, as the German
automaker aimed to boost revenues,
especially by selling companies to other
car makers. BMW was at €50.15 at the
end of the day, falling 0.4%.
Commerzbank also expected an improved
earnings after downsizing its workforce
and tackled its integration problem after
the bank purchased Dresdner Bank AG in
early 2009. In 1H 2010, Commerzbank
recorded an operating profit at €454
million. For 2012, the company aimed at
operating profit of €800 million. The
German bank was down 0.19% to €6.20.
On upgrades and
downgrades news,
Gleacher has set Dell at
NEUTRAL, while HP was
set at BUY. Dell was down
0.08% to $12.64, while HP was up 0.68%
to $41.26.
Disclaimer: This report is provided for information purposes
only. It is not an offer to sell or to buy any securities. This
report has been prepared based on sources believed to be
reliable, but there is no assurance or guarantee regarding its
completeness & and accuracy. The author accepts no
responsibility or liability arising from any use of the report.
E-mail: market.techspeak@gmail.com
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