Wall Street gains on hopes for "fiscal cliff" deal

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks turned higher on Wednesday on investors' hopes that a compromise could be reached to avoid the "fiscal cliff" after comments from U.S. House Speaker John Boehner and President Barack Obama.

Shares of Costco Wholesale Corp jumped 5.5 percent to $101.81 after the retailer became the latest company to announce a special dividend in case taxes jump next year.

The market sharply pared losses in volatile late morning trading after Boehner, the top Republican in Congress, said he was optimistic that a deal on the "fiscal cliff" to avert large tax hikes and spending cuts could be reached. That helped reverse a slide of 1 percent.

Adding to the more positive tone, the president, speaking later in the day, said he hoped to get a deal done before Christmas.

For weeks now, the market has been swinging back and forth on headlines from Washington. Wednesday's gyrations served to once again highlight the extent that the impasse is affecting the market and the likelihood of more volatility to come.

"There's only one issue in front of the financial markets, and it's the debate on the fiscal cliff," said Jack De Gan, chief investment officer of Harbor Advisory Corp in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.

"That's the only issue out there, and I think in the short term, there's not much that we can do other than watch, and try to anticipate what's going to happen."

One possible result of the deficit-reduction talks is a rise in the tax rate on dividends, prompting some companies to issue special dividends or move up plans for dividends.

The latest example is retailer Costco, which said it will pay a special dividend of roughly $3 billion to investors - the largest payout so far from any company ahead of a likely increase in the dividend tax. Costco also posted monthly same-store sales that beat forecasts. [ID:nL5E8MS8MP] Costco's stock hit an intraday high of $102.14, close to its 2012 high of $104.43 set on October 10.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> gained 79.75 points, or 0.62 percent, to 12,957.88. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> rose 5.87 points, or 0.42 percent, to 1,404.81. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> added 9.04 points, or 0.30 percent, to 2,976.83.

Knight Capital Group Inc shares jumped 14.1 percent to $3.39 on news that Getco LLC has sent a proposal for a merger between Getco and Knight Capital at a price of $3.39 per share, according to a regulatory filing.

Obama is meeting on Wednesday at the White House with chief executives from top corporations, including Goldman Sachs , Deloitte LLP and Caterpillar Inc , to discuss U.S. fiscal problems.

"While there's little that the president and vice president could do at today's meeting to improve moods in America's corner office, we still believe a legislative compromise will be reached before 'fiscal cliff' detonates," said Jack Ablin, chief investment officer of BMO Private Bank, in Chicago.

"In the meantime, we expect daunting headlines and emotional market volatility."

On the earnings front, Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc forecast quarterly and full-year earnings well ahead of analysts' expectations, helped by an expanded lineup of single-serve coffee makers and drinks. The company's stock surged 24 percent to $35.91.

The S&P 500's drop of 1 percent in the morning was partly caused by data that showed U.S. single-family home sales fell in October, casting a shadow over what has been one of the brighter spots in the U.S. economy.

Housing stocks fell after the data. The PHLX housing index <.hgx> slipped 0.5 percent. D.R. Horton Inc , the biggest U.S. home builder, fell 1.2 percent to $19.34.

(Reporting by Ed Krudy; Additional reporting by Gabriel Debenedetti; Editing by Jan Paschal)

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Protesters Gather Again in Cairo Streets to Denounce Morsi

CAIRO — Thousands of people flowed into the streets of Cairo, the Egyptian capital, Tuesday afternoon for a day of protest against President Mohamed Morsi’s attempt to assert broad new powers for the duration of the country’s political transition, dismissing his efforts just the night before to reaffirm his deference to Egyptian law and courts.

By early Tuesday afternoon in Cairo, a dense crowd of hundreds had gathered outside the headquarters of a trade group for lawyers, and thousands more had filed in around a small tent city in Tahrir Square. In an echo of the chants against Hosni Mubarak, Egyptian’s ousted president, almost two years ago, they shouted, “Leave, leave!” and “Bring down the regime!” They also denounced the spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamist group allied with Mr. Morsi.

A few blocks away, in a square near the American Embassy and the Interior Ministry headquarters, groups of young men resumed a running battle that began nine days ago, throwing rocks and tear gas canisters at riot police officers. Although those clashes grew out of anger over the deaths of dozens of protesters in similar clashes one year ago, many of the combatants have happily adopted the banner of protest against Mr. Morsi as well.

Egyptian television had captured the growing polarization of the country on Monday in split-screen coverage of two simultaneous funerals, each for a teenage boy killed in clashes set off by disputes over the new president’s powers. Thousands of supporters of Mr. Morsi and his allies in the Muslim Brotherhood marched through the streets of the Nile Delta city of Damanhour to bury a 15-year-old killed outside a Brotherhood office during an attack by protesters. And in Tahrir Square here in Cairo, thousands gathered to bury a 16-year-old killed in clashes with riot police officers and to chant slogans blaming Mr. Morsi for his death. “Morsi killed him,” the boy’s father said in a video statement circulated over the Internet.

“Now blood has been spilled by political factions, so this is not going to go away,” said Rabab el-Mahdi, a professor at the American University in Cairo and a left-leaning activist, adding that these were the first deaths rival factions had blamed on each other and not on the security forces of the Mubarak government since the uprising began last year. Still larger crowds were expected in the evening, as marchers from around the city headed for the square. Many schools and other businesses had closed in anticipation of bedlam, and on Monday, the Brotherhood called off a rival demonstration in support of the president, saying it wanted to avoid violence.

Egypt’s Supreme Judicial Council met again on Tuesday to consider its response to the president, and the leader of Al Azhar, a center of Sunni Muslim learning that is regarded as the pre-eminent moral authority here, met with groups of political leaders in an effort to resolve the battle over the president’s decree and the deadlock in the constitutional assembly, which is trying to draw up a new constitution.

But even as Mr. Morsi met with top judges Monday night in an effort to resolve the crisis, a coalition of opposition leaders held a news conference to declare that preserving the role of the courts was only the first step in a broader campaign against what Abdel Haleem Qandeil, a liberal intellectual, called “the miserable failure of the rule of the Muslim Brothers.” Mr. Morsi “unilaterally broke the contract with the people,” he declared. “We have to be ready to stand up to this group, protest to protest, square to square, and to confront the bullying.”

Mr. Morsi’s effort to remove the last check on his power over the political transition had brought the country’s fractious opposition groups together for the first time in a united front against the Brotherhood. But the show of unity papered over deep divisions between groups and even within them, said Ms. Mahdi of the American University.

“This is not a united front, and I am inside it,” she said. “Every single political group in the country is now divided over this — is this decree revolutionary justice or building a new dictatorship? Should we align ourselves with folool” — the colloquial term for the remnants of the old political elite — “or should we be revolutionary purists? Is it a conflict between the Muslim Brotherhood and the pro-Mubarak judiciary, or is this the beginning of a fascist regime in the making?”

Mayy El Sheikh contributed reporting.

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Nintendo says more than 400,000 Wii Us sold in US

NEW YORK (AP) — Nintendo has sold more than 400,000 of its new video game console, the Wii U, in its first week on sale in the U.S., the company said Monday.

The Wii U launched on Nov. 18 in the U.S. at a starting price of $ 300. Nintendo said the sales figure, based on internal estimates, is through Saturday, or seven days later.

The Wii U is the first major game console to launch in six years. It comes with a new touch-screen controller that promises to change how people play games by offering different people in the same room a different experience, depending on the controller used.

Six years ago, Nintendo Co. sold 475,000 of the original Wii in that console’s first seven days in stores, according to data from the NPD Group. The original Wii remains available, and Nintendo said it sold more than 300,000 of them last week, along with roughly 250,000 handheld Nintendo 3DS units and about 275,000 of the Nintendo DS.

At this early stage, demand isn’t the only factor dictating how many consoles are sold. Supply is, too. This means it’s likely that more people wanted to buy the Wii U in the first week than those who were able to. The original Wii was in short supply more than a year after it went on sale.

As of Monday afternoon, the website of Best Buy Co. was sold out of the Wii U. Video game retailer GameStop Corp. said there was at least a three day wait for a deluxe Wii U, which costs $ 350, has more memory and comes with a game called “Nintendo Land.” GameStop still had the basic, $ 300 version available.

Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter estimates that Nintendo will ship 1 million to 1.5 million Wii Us in the U.S. through the end of January.

Gaming News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Do You Like Emily Blunt as a Blonde?

Stylewatch
Style News Now

11/27/2012 at 01:00 PM ET

Gregory Pace/BEImages; Inset: Rex USA

She wasn’t trying to go incognito, but Emily Blunt was barely recognizable with her new hair color on Monday night.

“That’s not Emily Blunt,” one reader commented after we posted a photo to Instagram of Blunt at the Gotham Independent Film Awards in New York. “Yep, that’s not Emily Blunt,” someone else agreed.

But yes, it was Emily Blunt — and yes, she’d gone blonde! The British star debuted a strawberry-blonde hue at Monday night’s gala, hiding the hair color in a pretty, twisty updo, but leaving some light-colored strands out for us to see.

The actress — a natural brunette — often experiments with her hair color, having gone lighter for roles in the past and most recently rocking an ombré look.

Since she’s currently filming the sci-fi action flick All You Need Is Kill with Tom Cruise, we assume she dyed her hair for the role. But whether for work or for play, we’re really liking the lighter look. What do you think? Tell us: Do you like Blunt’s new blonde hair? 

PHOTOS: SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON EVEN MORE STAR HAIRSTYLES

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CDC: HIV spread high in young gay males

NEW YORK (AP) — Health officials say 1 in 5 new HIV infections occur in a tiny segment of the population — young men who are gay or bisexual.

The government on Tuesday released new numbers that spotlight how the spread of the AIDS virus is heavily concentrated in young males who have sex with other males. Only about a quarter of new infections in the 13-to-24 age group are from injecting drugs or heterosexual sex.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said blacks represented more than half of new infections in youths. The estimates are based on 2010 figures.

Overall, new U.S. HIV infections have held steady at around 50,000 annually. About 12,000 are in teens and young adults, and most youth with HIV haven't been tested.

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Online:

CDC report: http://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns

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Wall Street flat as caution reigns supreme

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks barely budged on Tuesday as wrangling continued in Washington over key budget talks, counterbalancing progress in easing Greece's debt burden and a slew of positive U.S. economic data.

A deal in Europe to release emergency aid to debt-laden Greece gave a brief early lift to stocks, but the news was not enough to sustain the gains as investors confronted the looming "fiscal cliff" at home that could bring higher taxes and spending cuts.

As Democrats and Republicans prepared to resume efforts to bridge their sharp differences over taming the federal debt this week in Washington, the market resumed its cautious stance.

A number of companies, including Wal-Mart and Las Vegas Sands , have issued special dividends aimed at helping investors avoid what could be a substantially increased tax burden next year. That continued on Tuesday, with Supertex and Heico Corp both announcing dividends. The number is expected to grow through the end of the year.

Las Vegas Sands, which made the announcement late Monday, jumped 5.7 percent to $46.54. Heico climbed 3 percent to $41.56, while Supertex rose 2.8 percent to $17.31.

"It's about your money, and it's about right now," said Frank Lesh, a futures analyst and broker at FuturePath Trading LLC in Chicago. "At this point, you have to make your moves and avoid the threat of more taxes.

"Until there is deal, I would expect to see more of those machinations - just in case," he said.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> dropped 23.45 points, or 0.18 percent, to 12,943.92. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> inched up just 0.15 of a point, or 0.01 percent, to 1,406.44. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> added 4.70 points, or 0.16 percent, to 2,981.48.

The market's worry is whether Congress and the White House can agree on ways to avoid some $600 billion in automatic spending cuts and tax increases that are due to kick in early next year. Some fear that dramatic fiscal restraint could push the U.S. economy into recession.

Market reaction was muted as data showed U.S. consumer confidence in November hit the highest level in more than four years and home prices in September rose for an eighth straight month.

In addition, a gauge of planned U.S. business spending increased by the most in five months in October, according to the Commerce Department's data on durable goods orders.

As of Monday's close, the S&P 500 was holding above 1,400, the level it reclaimed last week. But volume continued to be weak as traders waited for signs of any progress in negotiations to avoid the fiscal cliff. Last week, the S&P 500 gained nearly 4 percent.

Among individual stocks, Corning Inc shares rose 7.8 percent to $12.24 after the specialty glass maker said it expects full-year sales of its Gorilla glass, used in smartphones and tablets, to approach $1 billion.

McMoRan Exploration Co shares tumbled 12.5 percent to $8.44 after the oil and gas exploration company said on Monday that it could not achieve a measurable flow test at its Davy Jones No. 1 deep gas well in the Gulf of Mexico.

(Reporting by Edward Krudy; Additional reporting by Gabriel Debenedetti; Editing by Jan Paschal)

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Rebels Claim They Seized Air Bases and a Dam in Syria

Reuters

The bodies of Syrian civilians in a street in the northern city of Aleppo on Sunday, after opposition activists said they were shot by government forces.

BEIRUT, Lebanon — Fresh from declaring that they had seized an important military airport and an air defense base just outside Damascus, Syrian rebels on Monday said they overran a hydroelectric dam in the north of the country, adding to a monthlong string of tactical successes — capturing bases, disrupting supply routes and seizing weaponry — that demonstrate their ability to erode the government’s dominance in the face of withering aerial attacks.

The battlefield advances coincided with fresh claims of bloody events on the ground, with rebels saying a government airstrike on Sunday killed several schoolchildren in a playground. Video from the playground, which activists said was taken in the village of Dayr al-Asafir close to the Marj al-Sultan air base, showed at least half a dozen children who were dead or wounded from what activists said was a cluster bomb. The asphalt was pockmarked and littered with bomb casings.

On the ground lay two children: a young girl, identified as Anoud Mohammed, in a purple sweatsuit, and a child who appeared to be a toddler in a red sweater, their eyes open and staring. Around them people were carrying the limp bodies of other children whose bare feet were smeared with blood, as a woman knelt beside Anoud and screamed at the sky. In a later video, Anoud lay dead in a hospital.

“What’s her fault, this child?” a man’s voice shouted. “What’s her fault, Bashar, this little girl?”

On Monday, the conflict was reported once again to have spilled beyond Syria’s border, drawing in Turkish antiaircraft gunners who were said by the insurgents to have opened fire on a government warplane that appeared to have entered Turkish airspace as it attacked rebel positions in the Syrian town of Atma, just across the 550-mile Turkish-Syrian border.

According to two antigovernment Syrian opposition groups — the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the Local Coordinating Committees — and a fighter on the ground, who gave his name only as Saado, the Turkish fire deterred an attack on an area that includes a rebel headquarters and a camp for internally displaced Syrians. But there was no confirmation of the episode from Turkey, and the Syrian state news agency did not refer to the rebels’ claims.

Government warplanes also attacked the Bab al-Hawa border crossing at the Turkish border, an area where rebels have enjoyed control for several months, according to an antigovernment activist in Turkey. Many internally displaced Syrians have taken refuge in the area and fled in terror from the fighting, said the activist, who gave his name as Abu Zaki. The strike showed the government’s ability to strike at will from the air even in rebel-held territory where it has no control on the ground.

Syria and Turkey have exchanged mortar fire on numerous occasions in recent months, and Turkey, a NATO member, has requested that the alliance provide it with Patriot antimissile batteries, a possible step toward creating a de facto no-fly zone in northern Syria to protect rebels from Syrian government air attacks. Turkey has come under criticism from Russia and others for the request.

On Monday, Turkey’s military insisted that the Patriot missiles would be used only to defend Turkish territory. “Deployment of air and missile defense systems is a measure solely against potential air and missile threats that might come from Syria,” said a statement posted on the Turkish Army’s Web site. “It is out of question for it to be used either for a ‘no fly zone’ or an offensive operation.”

A group of NATO experts was expected to start assessing Turkey’s 550-mile southern border with Syria to identify sites for possible bases, and determine staffing and other technical details. The foreign troops that would accompany the Patriot systems would be subject to a special agreement, the statement said.

On Monday, amateur video, which could not be verified, showed what was purported to be rebel soldiers ransacking boxes of captured weapons, including hand grenades and rocket-propelled grenades at the Tishreen Dam near the town of Menbej. “Here are your spoils, Bashar,” a voice can be heard saying, referring to President Bashar al-Assad. “Here are your weapons, Bashar. God is great,” a rebel exclaims as two men are filmed carrying off a trunk of munitions.

Rebel forces had been besieging the dam’s defenses on the Euphrates River for days.

Anne Barnard reported from Beirut, C.J. Chivers from the United States, and Alan Cowell from Paris. Reporting was contributed by Hwaida Saad, Hania Mourtada and Hala Droubi from Beirut

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Nokia unveils 2 new cellphone models, priced at $62

HELSINKI (Reuters) – Struggling Finnish cellphone maker Nokia unveiled on Monday two new cellphone models, the Asha 205 and the Asha 206, pricing both models at around $ 62, excluding subsidies and taxes.

Both models will go on sale this quarter.

Nokia unveiled a new Slam feature which allows consumers to share multimedia content like photos and videos with nearby friends almost instantly through Bluetooth connection.

(Reporting By Tarmo Virki)

Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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How Will Larry Hagman's Death Affect Season 2 of Dallas?

TV Watch

TV News

11/26/2012 at 12:45 PM EST

Larry Hagman as J.R. Ewing

TNT

What will happen to J.R. Ewing?

Before his death on Friday from complications from throat cancer, Larry Hagman, who plays the devious oil tycoon, had filmed six of 15 episodes for season 2 of Dallas.

Now, the show's writers and producers will have to find a way to finish filming the season without the show's most iconic character.

According to EW.com, producers want to give J.R. "the proper sendoff that he deserves."

"Larry Hagman was a giant, a larger-than-life personality whose iconic performance as J.R. Ewing will endure as one of the most indelible in entertainment history," executive producers Cynthia Cidre and Michael M. Robin said in a statement on Friday.

In the show's first season, an aging – but still scheming – J.R. spent some time in a nursing home to be treated for depression.

TNT, which airs Dallas, said in a statement: "We will be forever thankful that a whole new generation of people got to know and appreciate Larry through his performance as J.R. Ewing."

Deadline.com reports that it's currently unclear how Hagman's death will affect the show but speculates there may be a hiatus in filming, so "the writers can rework the scripts for the remaining episodes" without him.

Like the 1980 cliffhanger on the original Dallas – which left viewers asking, "Who shot J.R.?" – a farewell episode will likely be must-watch TV for fans.

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Wall Street falls on caution after rally, retail drags

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks eased on Monday as a mixed start to the holiday shopping season, caution over Greek aid talks and budget discussions in Washington gave investors reason to pause after Wall Street posted its best week in over five months.

While holiday shopping appeared to be off to a good start, analysts cautioned against reading too much into one weekend's numbers. Retailers need to sustain the initial burst through the November-December holiday season, which can account for a third of annual sales and 40 to 50 percent of profits for the year.

Shares in department store operator Macy's Inc , which offered consumers deep discounts on Black Friday, fell 3.6 percent to $40.22. The SPDR S&P retail exchange-traded fund fell 1.3 percent to $62.39.

"The underwhelming performance of retailers in general is hurting the market," said Michael James, a senior trader at Wedbush Morgan in Los Angeles. "Retail is certainly seeing a mixed bag."

Investors continued to chew over two of the greatest overhangs for markets. Euro zone finance ministers and the International Monetary Fund will seek to unfreeze the second bailout package for Greece on Monday. At the same time, U.S. lawmakers have made little progress in the past 10 days toward a compromise to avoid the harsh tax increases and government spending cuts schedule to start in January.

"Friday was a big day in the stock market," said Tim Ghriskey, chief investment officer at Solaris Group in Bedford Hills, New York. "So it's not surprising at all to see some profit-taking on that."

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> dropped 88.58 points, or 0.68 percent, to 12,921.10. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> fell 8.40 points, or 0.60 percent, to 1,400.75. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> lost 5.84 points, or 0.20 percent, to 2,961.01.

Total spending for the Black Friday long weekend rose 12.8 percent from last year, to $59.1 billion, from last year, according to the National Retail Federation. That pace was down from the prior year's 16.4 percent increase.

Black Friday's online sales topped $1 billion for the first time ever as more consumers used the Internet do their early holiday shopping, comScore Inc said on Sunday.

Major indexes ended last week with gains of 3 to 4 percent, recovering some of their losses following an 8 percent correction since September. The Dow and S&P 500 both closed above key technical levels for the first time since November 6, which could provide additional support. The Dow ended above 13,000, while the S&P broke above 1,400.

In company news, shares of Knight Capital Group Inc jumped 10.4 percent to $2.75. A source familiar with the matter on Saturday said the company is in talks about possibly selling its market-making operation, its largest and most profitable business, but it is not known if a deal will happen. Knight's chief executive, in an internal memo, said the company currently is in talks with at least two firms on the possible sale of its largest business unit, but would only pursue a deal if it created value for its shareholders and clients.

Qatar has cashed in its remaining warrants in Britain's Barclays Plc , a move that should yield a $280 million profit. The warrants have not yet been converted, but conversion would dilute the holding of shares by other investors. U.S.-listed shares of Barclays fell 5.6 percent to $15.37.

Apple Inc has asked a federal court to add six more products to its patent infringement lawsuit against Samsung Electronics Co , including the Samsung Galaxy Note II, in the latest move in an ongoing legal war between the two companies. Apple shares were up 1.7 percent at $581.

(Additional reporting by Gabriel Debenedetti; Editing by Kenneth Barry and Leslie Adler)

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