Friday, September 11, 2009

9/11/09 am Fri PG to Cut Prices, Stock Soars

The following is not intended as advertising by a broker-dealer and is not a research report.

Post #101 The following is brought to you by Intellivest Securities Research, Inc. The following is not intended as advertising by a broker-dealer and is not a research report. Towards the end of this Blog is an update of the Dow 30's most recent SEC filings.

A read of Friday's 9/11/09 print editions of: Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, Investors Business Daily, New York Times, Atl Journal Const, USA Today and the 9/11/09 issue of the Atlanta Business Chronicle yielded the following stories about Dow Jones Industrial Average 30 component companies and the Dow with stories about the Dow aggregated first and then items about Dow Jones Industrial Average 30 companies presented alphabetically, followed by symbol and Thursday's closing price and related data:

Dow: WSJ pC1 "Dow, Up 80.26, Adds A fifth Day to Its Run" by Peter A. McKay says telecom and energy stocks led the market to a fifth gain in a row and fresh highs for the year. Procter & Gamble was the biggest contributer to Thursday's gain in the price-weighted average, up 4.2%.

WSJ pC5 "Large Stock Focus - AT&T, Disney, P&G Lead List of Gainers" by Geoffrey Rogow says another broad rally pushed major stock averages to their highest closes of '09 on Thurs with a diverse group including Walt Disney and Procter & Gamble pacing the market higher, while AT&T led a surge for telecommunications firms. 3M is mentioned as being up 1.7% along with Chevron up 1.6%. For telecoms AT&T was up 2.4% and Verizon was up 1.5%.

Fin Times p22 "Wall Street - Relief over Treasury auction helps S&P climb to '09 peak" by Samantha Pearson says Wall Street stocks hit fresh highs for the year following a shaky start yesterday, after encouraging data on jobs and a successful Treasury bond auction reassured investors. It says airlines lifted the market after an analyst from JPMorgan said demand was not as bad as feared. PG, the company behind brands such as Gillette and Pantene, rose 4.2% after it raised its earnings forecast for '10 above analyst expectations.

NYT pB7 "Stocks & Bonds - They Rally, 347 Points in 5 Days, Continues" says investors pushed up stocks Thurs. on Wall Street after a drop in weekly unemployment claims and an upbeat forecast from Procter & Gamble.

Inv. Bus Daily pA1 "Stocks Tack On Gains As IbD 100 Keeps Lead Role" by Paul Whitfield says leading stocks once again led the pack Thurs. as the major indexes tacked on more gains.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed Thursday at 9627.48 up 80.26 or 0.84% from Wednesday's close of 9547.22. Of the 30 Dow Companies: 21 gained and 9 declined with the biggest loser being Kraft KFT $26.19 -0.66 2.46% 23,718,729 NYSE and the biggest gainer being Procter & Gamble PG $56.04 +2.28 4.24% 26,137,885 NYSE.

The current divisor for the Dow found at today's page C4 of The Wall St. Jrnl is .132319125 unchanged. Thursday's Dow Jones Industrial Average closing numerator was 1273.90 up 10.62 from Wednesday's closing Dow numerator of 1263.28. This is the sum of all 30 closing prices. A short cut to the Dow numerator is to multiply the closing Dow by the Divisor. Now, if you divide the Dow numerator increase for today of 10.62 by the divisor you get 80.26, the increase in Thursday's Dow close.

The average closing price (the closing numerator divided by 30) of Thursday's Dow Jones Industrial Average was 42.26 up 0.35 from Wednesday's Dow Jones Industrial Average closing price of 42.11. The median closing price of Thursday's Dow Jones Industrial Average was 38.71 up 0.23 from Wednesday's Dow Jones median closing price of 38.48. The highest closing price Thursday again was IBM $117.67 +0.91 0.78% 4,794,174 NYSE and the lowest closing price Thursday again was Alcoa AA $12.84 +0.03 0.23% 21,547,322 NYSE. The lowest volume Thursday again was MMM $74.39 +1.21 1.65% 4,123,800 NYSE and the highest volume again was Bank of Am BAC $17.22 +0.18 1.06% 173,173,715 NYSE.

If Thursday morning before the market opened you had purchased $100 of each of the Dow Jones Industrial Average 30 shares (assuming you could buy fractional shares and assuming no transaction costs) and sold at the close you would have made $1,060
($127,390 - $126,330)

AT&T T $26.56 +0.62 2.39% 34,920,689 NYSE: WSJ pC5 "Large Stock Focus - AT&T, Disney, P&G Lead List of Gainers" by Geoffrey Rogow says another broad rally pushed major stock averages to their highest closes of '09 on Thurs with a diverse group including Walt Disney and Procter & Gamble pacing the market higher, while AT&T led a surge for telecommunications firms. 3M is mentioned as being up 1.7% along with Chevron up 1.6%. For telecoms AT&T was up 2.4% and Verizon was up 1.5%.

WSJ pB5 "Sprint Plan Ups Ante in Wireless market" by Roger Cheng says Sprint Nextel Corp. launched a monthly service plan offering unlimited calls to any US cellphone, as competition continues to intensify and the No. 3 US carrier tries to stem customer defections and compete against the top 2 players, Verizon Wirelss (jv between Verizon Communications Inc. and Vodafone Group PlC) and AT&T.

Fin Times p14 "Coalition has its sights set on monitoring all viewing habits - Moves threaten Nielsen dominance - Initial funding is expected to be $1.5m" by Kenneth Li says a group called the Coailtion for Innovative Media Measurement made up of GE's NBC Universal, Time Warner, Disney, Procter & Gamble, AT&T, Unilever, Discovery, CBS, and Viacom have formed a new venture to investigate ways to measure viewers across TV, mobile phone and computer screens in a move that could upset Nielsen's control on media tracking. Similar story at NYT pB2 "Media Group To Research New Methods for Ratings" by Brian Stelter.


Atlanta Business Chronicle p1A "Rift threatens city's sports promotions" by Douglas Sams and J. Scott Trubey says that Georgia's top sports marketer is involved in a controvery over whether Atlanta is a bigger college or pro sports town. The controversy arises out of comments made in the local media by Gary Stokan, pres. of Atlanta Sports Council who called Georgia Tech and the University of Georgia "the city's two biggest pro sports teams." Despite the weak economy in 2008, Atlanta was home to 4 of the top 100 companies that spent money on sports marketing, according to Street & Smith's SportsBusiness Journal, a sister publication of Atlanta Business Chronicle. The list included AT&T Mobility (no. 2 with $243.3 mil), the US division of Coke at No. 11 at $107.9 mil and Home Depot at no. 27 with $64.6 mil. The article quotes Bob Hope, co-founder of public relations firm Hope-Beckham Inc. as saying "Sports is a religion, but college football is a cult."

Alcoa AA
$12.84 +0.03 0.23% 21,547,322 NYSE: WSJ pC5 "Options Report - Alcoa Inspires Volatility Bets" by Tennille Tracy says traders behaved mroe like merchants than consumers Thurs, opting to sell options rather than buy them as the stock market continued to hum along at a modest pace. Traders were selling options they didn't own betting on a decline in volatility and therefore a reduction in options prices or the ability of stocks to stay above or below certain prices. In Alcoa, as an example, a traders showed sold a Jan. $16 call in order to collect 0.65 and will make make money as long as Alcoa's stock stays below $16.65 before early next year, a level it hasn't reached since last Oct.

AXP $34.4 +0.31 0.91% 9,958,623 NYSE: No mentions found.

Bank of Am BAC
$17.22 +0.18 1.06% 173,173,715 NYSE: WSJ pC3 "Merrill Veteran Orcel Is Staing With BofA" by Dan Fitzpatrick & Dana Cimillusa says BAC named a new leadership team for its global investment banking unit & announced new responsibilities for top London deals generator Andrea Orcel as the bank embarks on a global expansion push following its takeover of Merrill.

NYTimes pB2 "Winners, Losers: One Year Later" says after the carnage that followed the bankruptcy of Lehman Bros. a year ago, it is clear that Goldman Sachs is a winner. Story says JPMorgan swooped in less than 2 weeks afer Lehman's demise to acquire Washing Mutual, Morgan, led by Jamie Dimon, used its position as one of the few strong lenders to capture market share in corporate finance. It says that Bank of Am didn't do so well because its stock is down 35% an GE is hurting as well with its stock down nearly half its value.

Atlanta Business Chronicle at p2B "Clients nearing retirement re-assess portfolios" by Michael Hunter says Bank of America and Merrill Lynch retirement surveys conducted between 2006 and 2008 show the average retiremen age moving from 60 to 61 in 2006 to 63 to 64 in 2008.

Atlanta Business Chronice at p2B "Financial industry preparing for recovery" by John Inhouse says the conmbination of Merrill Lynch & Co. and Bank of America allows the combine service to prove more incomplete investment and banking solutions to its client.

Atlanta Business Chronice at p5b "Atlanta's Top 25 Financial Planning & Advisory Firms - Ranked by assets under management in Atlanta" ranks Bank of America's Merrill Lynch as number 1 with $78 bil under management in Atlanta and $1.2 trillion under management nationwide.

BA $50.49 -0.04 0.08% 3,826,873 NYSE: No mentions found.

CAT $48.69 +0.28 0.58% 8,175,822 NYSE: No mentions found.

Chevron CVX $71.45 +1.12 1.59% 9,739,461 NYSE: Fin Times p3 "Chevron backs huge gas project - US group to spend $42 bil - Scheme will refocus LNG industry" by Carola Hoyos & Peter Smith says Gorgon, one of the world's most ambitious and costly natural gas proejcts, will be given the official go ahead next week when Chevron approves an investment of about $42 bil in the project off Western Australia. These amounts are in Australian money and I am sorry the article doesn't convert into US dollars, blame the Financial Times.

WSJ pC5 "Large Stock Focus - AT&T, Disney, P&G Lead List of Gainers" by Geoffrey Rogow says another broad rally pushed major stock averages to their highest closes of '09 on Thurs with a diverse group including Walt Disney and Procter & Gamble pacing the market higher, while AT&T led a surge for telecommunications firms. 3M is mentioned as being up 1.7% along with Chevron up 1.6%. For telecoms AT&T was up 2.4% and Verizon was up 1.5%.

CSCO $23.01 +0.78 3.51% 75,508,306 NASDAQ-GS: No mentions found.

Coke KO $50.58 -0.05 0.1% 10,644,787 NYSE WSJ pC3 Peter Lattman's "Deal Journal" discussed the Suntory bid to buy Orangina and notes that in 1984 Pernod Ricard acquired Orangina hoping to extend its brand world-wide but it couldn't compete with Coke and Pepsi.

Atlanta Business Chronicle p1A "Rift threatens city's sports promotions" by Douglas Sams and J. Scott Trubey says that Georgia's top sports marketer is involved in a controvery over whether Atlanta is a bigger college or pro sports town. The controversy arises out of comments made in the local media by Gary Stokan, pres. of Atlanta Sports Council who called Georgia Tech and the University of Georgia "the city's two biggest pro sports teams." Despite the weak economy in 2008, Atlanta was home to 4 of the top 100 companies that spent money on sports marketing, according to Street & Smith's SportsBusiness Journal, a sister publication of Atlanta Business Chronicle. The list included AT&T Mobility (no. 2 with $243.3 mil), the US division of Coke at No. 11 at $107.9 mil and Home Depot at no. 27 with $64.6 mil. The article quotes Bob Hope, co-founder of public relations firm Hope-Beckham Inc. as saying "Sports is a religion, but college football is a cult."


Disney DIS
$28.36 +1.41 5.23% 21,496,754 NYSE: WSJ pC5 "Large Stock Focus - AT&T, Disney, P&G Lead List of Gainers" by Geoffrey Rogow says another broad rally pushed major stock averages to their highest closes of '09 on Thurs with a diverse group including Walt Disney and Procter & Gamble pacing the market higher, while AT&T led a surge for telecommunications firms. 3M is mentioned as being up 1.7% along with Chevron up 1.6%. For telecoms AT&T was up 2.4% and Verizon was up 1.5%.

WSJ pB1 "Talk Is Cheaper for Ads on NBC's Leno" by Sam Schechner & Suzanne Vranica says in the weeks leading up to NBC's launch of The Jay Leno Show advetisers are buying spots for half what they'd spend per commercial in new episodes of dramas on competing networks at the same time of night. The number of people watching shows on weeknights between 10 & 11 pm on NBC and Disney's ABC has declined 23% from three TV seasons ago, to a combined 23.8 million on average this season through Aug. 30.

Fin Times p14 "Coalition has its sights set on monitoring all viewing habits - Moves threaten Nielsen dominance - Initial funding is expected to be $1.5m" by Kenneth Li says a group called the Coalition for Innovative Media Measurement made up of GE's NBC Universal, Time Warner, Disney, Procter & Gamble, AT&T, Unilever, Discovery, CBS, and Viacom have formed a new venture to investigate ways to measure viewers across TV, mobile phone and computer screens in a move that could upset Nielsen's control on media tracking. Similar story at NYT pB2 "Media Group To Research New Methods for Ratings" by Brian Stelter.

DD $32.09 +0.73 2.33% 6,713,838 NYSE: No mentions found.

XOM $70.65 +0.15 0.21% 19,100,528 NYSE: No mentions found.

GE $14.8 -0.07 0.47% 119,302,472 NYSE: WSJ pC10 "Will Vivendi Star in New NBC Drama Coming This Fall?" Each Nov Vivendi can trigger a right to sell its 20% stake in NBC Universal either in the market or to NBCU's parent GE and if this option was exercised it would test what buyers really think about core Hollywood businesses - a major film studio, broadcast TV network and major cable channels.

Fin Times p14 "Coalition has its sights set on monitoring all viewing habits - Moves threaten Nielsen dominance - Initial funding is expected to be $1.5m" by Kenneth Li says a group called the Coalition for Innovative Media Measurement made up of GE's NBC Universal, Time Warner, Disney, Procter & Gamble, AT&T, Unilever, Discovery, CBS, and Viacom have formed a new venture to investigate ways to measure viewers across TV, mobile phone and computer screens in a move that could upset Nielsen's control on media tracking. Similar story at NYT pB2 "Media Group To Research New Methods for Ratings" by Brian Stelter.

NYTimes pB2 "Winners, Losers: One Year Later" says after the carnage that followed the bankruptcy of Lehman Bros. a year ago, it is clear that Goldman Sachs is a winner. Story says JPMorgan swooped in less than 2 weeks afer Lehman's demise to acquire Washing Mutual, Morgan, led by Jamie Dimon, used its position as one of the few strong lenders to capture market share in corporate finance. It says that Bank of Am didn't do so well because its stock is down 35% and GE is hurting as well with its stock down nearly half its value.

HPQ $46.5 +0.52 1.13% 14,761,603 NYSE: No mentions found.

Home Depot HD $27.53 +0.15 0.55% 9,388,075 NYSE: Atlanta Business Chronicle p1A "Rift threatens city's sports promotions" by Douglas Sams and J. Scott Trubey says that Georgia's top sports marketer is involved in a controvery over whether Atlanta is a bigger college or pro sports town. The controversy arises out of comments made in the local media by Gary Stokan, pres. of Atlanta Sports Council who called Georgia Tech and the University of Georgia "the city's two biggest pro sports teams." Despite the weak economy in 2008, Atlanta was home to 4 of the top 100 companies that spent money on sports marketing, according to Street & Smith's SportsBusiness Journal, a sister publication of Atlanta Business Chronicle. The list included AT&T Mobility (no. 2 with $243.3 mil), the US division of Coke at No. 11 at $107.9 mil and Home Depot at no. 27 with $64.6 mil. The article quotes Bob Hope, co-founder of public relations firm Hope-Beckham Inc. as saying "Sports is a religion, but college football is a cult."

INTC $19.76 -0.17 0.85% 48,664,964 NASDAQ-GS: No mentions found.

IBM $117.67 +0.91 0.78% 4,794,174 NYSE: No mentions found.

JPMorgan JPM $43.02 +0.16 0.37% 24,918,110 NYSE: NYTimes pB2 "Winners, Losers: One Year Later" says after the carnage that followed the bankruptcy of Lehman Bros. a year ago, it is clear that Goldman Sachs is a winner. Story says JPMorgan swooped in less than 2 weeks afer Lehman's demise to acquire Washing Mutual, Morgan, led by Jamie Dimon, used its position as one of the few strong lenders to capture market share in corporate finance. It says that Bank of Am didn't do so well because its stock is down 35% and GE is hurting as well with its stock down nearly half its value.

Fin Times p22 "Wall Street - Relief over Treasury auction helps S&P climb to '09 peak" by Samantha Pearson says Wall Street stocks hit fresh highs for the year following a shaky start yesterday, after encouraging data on jobs and a successful Treasury bond auction reassured investors. It says airlines lifted the market after an analyst from JPMorgan said demand was not as bad as feared. PG, the company behind brands such as Gillette and Pantene, rose 4.2% after it raised its earnings forecast for '10 above analyst expectations.

JNJ $60.66 -0.26 0.43% 8,772,369 NYSE: No mentions found.

Kraft KFT
$26.19 -0.66 2.46% 23,718,729 NYSE: Fin Times p8 has a letter from Martin E. Simons of London, Kraft bid risks emasculating great British brand' saing it is not in the national interest of UK for foreign companies to dominate UK industry.

MCD $54.85 -0.24 0.44% 12,413,840 NYSE: No mentions found.

MRK $31.96 +0.41 1.3% 14,834,739 NYSE: No mentions found.

Microsoft MSFT
$25 +0.22 0.89% 45,107,357 NASDAQ-GS: Fin Times p13 "google in books database offer- Gesture to rivals over access to works - Objections raised over company's influence" by Ricahrd Wates says Google offered to give internet rivals, access to its massive database of digital books as it renewed efforts to counter a wave of opposition stirred up by its landmark legal settlement industry. The gesture was rebuffed a a lawyer representing opponents of the deal such as Amazon, Microsoft and Yahoo.

PFE $16.34 +0.17 1.05% 45,796,331 NYSE: No mentions found.

Procter & Gamble PG
$56.04 +2.28 4.24% 26,137,885 NYSE: WSJ pB3 "Corporate News - P&G Plots Course to Turn Lacluster Tide - new Chief McDonald Plans Price Cuts, Expansion Abroad and Repositioning Cheer as a Low-price Detergent" by Ellen Byron says PG's ceo Robert McDonald laid out measures to address lackluster profits and sagging market share, including price cuts, overseas expansion and plans to reposition the Cheer brand as a low price detergent. There is an accompanying photo of Robert McDonald with high forehead, arched eyebrows, and gesturing hands that has him looking very intelligent, calculating and confident.

NYT pB7 "Procter & Gamble Predicts Sales Will Recover in Fall" says PG officials say they expect sales to begin rebounding this fall as the company cuts prices and adds new versions of its consumer products that emphasize value. They expect the sale of PG's prescription drug biz to increase earnings by 0.32 to 0.34 cents a share this fiscal year and they project organic sales growth of 1 to 4 percent for the quarter ending in Dec. Organic sales are sales not related to acquisitons and this metric has fallen the past 2 quarters.

WSJ pC5 "Large Stock Focus - AT&T, Disney, P&G Lead List of Gainers" by Geoffrey Rogow says another broad rally pushed major stock averages to their highest closes of '09 on Thurs with a diverse group including Walt Disney and Procter & Gamble pacing the market higher, while AT&T led a surge for telecommunications firms. 3M is mentioned as being up 1.7% along with Chevron up 1.6%. For telecoms AT&T was up 2.4% and Verizon was up 1.5%.

WSJ pC5 "The Good News . . ." charts PG saying it plans to cut prices and increase promotions to boost sales.

WSJ pC8 "Warner Chilcott to Get A 4 Piece Deal Financing" by Min Zeng says new details emerged Thurs on the $4.15 bil financing backing Warner Chilcott's purchase of Procter & Gamble's prescription drug biz. It will be a $1.5 bil institutional term loan with a $1 bil term loan and a $250 mil revolving credit facility.

Fin Times p14 "Coalition has its sights set on monitoring all viewing habits - Moves threaten Nielsen dominance - Initial funding is expected to be $1.5m" by Kenneth Li says a group called the Coalition for Innovative Media Measurement made up of GE's NBC Universal, Time Warner, Disney, Procter & Gamble, AT&T, Unilever, Discovery, CBS, and Viacom have formed a new venture to investigate ways to measure viewers across TV, mobile phone and computer screens in a move that could upset Nielsen's control on media tracking.

Fin Times p22 "Wall Street - Relief over Treasury auction helps S&P climb to '09 peak" by Samantha Pearson says Wall Street stocks hit fresh highs for the year following a shaky start yesterday, after encouraging data on jobs and a successful Treasury bond auction reassured investors. It says airlines lifted the market after an analyst from JPMorgan said demand was not as bad as feared. PG, the company behind brands such as Gillette and Pantene, rose 4.2% after it raised its earnings forecast for '10 above analyst expectations.

AJC pA20 "P&G adjusts strategies to pull bargain hunters" says the world's largest consumer products maker, a bellwether of consumer spending, has shifted tactics in the chase for bargain hunting shoppers with price cuts, promotions emphasizing value, and a shakkup of its famed laundry business.

MMM $74.39 +1.21 1.65% 4,123,800 NYSE: No mentions found.

TRV $48.52 -0.62 1.26% 4,820,832 NYSE: No mentions found.

UTX $61.95 +0.71 1.16% 4,558,746 NYSE: No mentions found.

Verizon VZ
$31.35 +0.46 1.49% 20,590,821 NYSE: WSJ pB5 "Sprint Plan Ups Ante in Wireless market" by Roger Cheng says Sprint Nextel Corp. launched a monthly service plan offering unlimited calls to any US cellphone, as competition continues to intensify and the No. 3 US carrier tries to stem customer defections and compete against the top 2 players, Verizon Wirelss (jv between Verizon Communications Inc. and Vodafone Group PlC) and AT&T.

WSJ pC5 "Large Stock Focus - AT&T, Disney, P&G Lead List of Gainers" by Geoffrey Rogow says another broad rally pushed major stock averages to their highest closes of '09 on Thurs with a diverse group including Walt Disney and Procter & Gamble pacing the market higher, while AT&T led a surge for telecommunications firms. 3M is mentioned as being up 1.7% along with Chevron up 1.6%. For telecoms AT&T was up 2.4% and Verizon was up 1.5%.

WMT $51.03 -0.08 0.16% 22,820,953 NYSE: No mentions found.