Wall Street Breakfast: Must-Know News

• Lawmakers set to draft bailout bill. Congress inched toward approving the Treasury's $700B plan to rescue the U.S. financial system. President Bush called an emergency meeting for Thursday to hammer out details, after addressing the public Wednesday night (text). Nervous investors continue to flock to cash and safe-haven assets, briefly sending short-term interest rates below zero. Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd is optimistic: "We're not there yet," he told reporters, but there's a "good possibility we'll get there in a day or so." Bush told the nation it faces a 'long and painful recession' if it fails to act. "Our entire economy is in danger."
• GE outlook dims. GE (GE) lowered its guidance for Q3, sending its shares down 5%. Index futures also gapped down. GE now sees Q3 EPS of $0.43-0.48 (vs. $0.52 consensus) due to "weakness and volatility in the financial services markets." For the full-year, it expects EPS of $1.95-2.10 (vs. $2.21 consensus). To strengthen its capital and liquidity position, GE said it will: 1) Inject capital into GE Capital to reduce leverage ratios by reducing the GE Capital dividend to GE to 10% from 40% of GE Capital's earnings and by suspending the current GE stock buyback. 2) Reduce GE Capital's commercial paper to 10-15% of GE Capital's total debt going forward. 3) Resize GE to deliver 60/40 industrial/financial services earnings split by end of 2009. It maintained its quarterly dividend of $0.31.
• WaMu talks with private-equity groups. Washington Mutual (WM) has approached private-equity firms - including Carlyle and Blackstone (BX) - to gauge their interest in a potential takeover, sources say. WaMu continues to explore other options, include a sale to another financial institution, though Santander (STD) has now dropped out, and TD Bank (TD) seems largely uninterested. JP Morgan (JPM), Citigroup (C) and Wells Fargo (WFC) have conducted some due diligence, but are reluctant to absorb WaMu's loans. This morning, Fitch noted there is an increased likelihood of a partial sale - leading to greater uncertainty for debt holders.

WSB Sponsor

The Value Investing Congress is almost SOLD OUT! Register by 9/26 and save $300.

Join us at the 4th Annual New York Value Investing Congress, Oct. 6-7 in NYC, to learn from some of the world's smartest investors how to navigate through this precarious time, find dramatically undervalued stocks and benefit from recent market fluctuations.

Register today! Your next great investment idea could be waiting in NYC.

• Citigroup shops Primerica. Citigroup (C) may sell its Primerica life insurance unit to J.C. Flowers and Protective Life (PL), sources say. Analysts think it could go for $7.5B.
• GE wouldn't prop up Lehman. Sources say Lehman (LEH) CEO Richard Fuld reached out to Jeff Immelt, General Electric's (GE) CEO, about taking an investment in the investment bank before it collapsed. Fuld hoped Immelt would take a 20% stake in Lehman. Fuld also turned to then-AIG CEO Marty Sullivan. "The moves highlight the sense of desperation that overwhelmed Fuld as his firm hurtled toward a bitter end amid a credit crunch that also threatened to topple Merrill Lynch (MER) and caused Goldman Sachs (GS) and Morgan Stanley (MS) to recast themselves as bank holding companies." While many hold Fuld personally responsible for LEH's downfall, there's probably some truth to the words of a peer: "Unless you've been on the 31st floor, you'd never understand what he's been through."
• Dell outlines comeback. Dell (DELL), #2 global PC maker, will focus on capturing sales from H-P (HPQ), it says. CEO Michael Dell told reporters in Brussels today Dell will continue to grow faster than the industry this year, and remains "very competitive" in pricing - while conceding there will be some industry-wide fallout from the financial crisis. Dell wants to trim up to $3B in annual expenses over the next three years by eliminating jobs and outsourcing. The company will, however, continue to operate some independent factories.
• Foul future. Chicken producer Pilgrim's Pride (PPC) warned it expects a significant Q3 loss, and said it may go into default with its lends unless they waive or amend its current debt covenant. PPC has been hurt by surging grain and energy costs, weak pricing and demand for chicken, and by its debt load following a 2006 $1B purchase of Gold Kist. Shares fell 38% Wednesday.
• Yet another iTunes challenger. In an effort to challenge online rivals and loosen Apple's (AAPL) grip on the music industry, News Corp.'s (NWS) MySpace will today launch MySpace Music, a new online music service. MySpace Music users will be able to stream tracks for free from large music catalogues, with an option of buying through Amazon.com. Universal Music, Sony BMG (SNE) and Warner Music Group (WMG) own about 40% of the venture.
• CBRC promises lending as usual. CBRC, China's banking regulator, tried to calm market fears by strongly denying a report that domestic banks had been told to stop lending to or borrowing from U.S. financial institutions. However, unnamed traders acknowledged that some Chinese banks had indeed stopped lending to U.S. banks, at least temporarily. Undisputed is that Chinese banks, in an effort to limit exposures to troubled credit markets, have moved to curb approvals for interest-rate swap agreements with international financial firms.
• Mortgage activity backtracks. Mortgage applications fell by a whopping 10.6% from a week ago, MBA said. The average interest rate on 30-year fixed-rate mortgages increased to 6.08% from 5.82%. Refinancing and purchase activity both suffered as mortgage rates soared during one of the most tumultuous weeks in U.S. financial-market history; refinancing application volume fell 11.2%, while purchase application activity dropped 10%. Even FHA loan applications, one of the few remaining strengths in the current mortgage market, tumbled by 8.9%. [HW]
• Existing home sales highlight need for housing reform - NAR. Existing home sales fell 2.2% from July to 4.91M, NAR said, just below the 4.94M consensus. Sales are down 10.7% from a year ago. Interest rates have declined, but "there is a serious question as to whether a cash infusion by the U.S. Treasury into Wall Street would help consumers by improving mortgage funding," it said, urging Congress to address the housing market separately: "Congress needs to take care of Main Street and not just bail out Wall Street." NAR chief economist Lawrence Yun joined the dots: "Historically, housing has led the nation out of economic doldrums – there will not be an economic recovery without a housing recovery."

Earnings: Thursday Before Open

• McCormick & Company (MKC): FQ3 EPS of $0.50 beats by $0.02. Revenue of $782M (+9.1%) in-line. [PR]
• Rite Aid (RAD): Q2 EPS of -$0.27 misses by $0.12. Same-store sales +0.6%. Sees full-year EPS of -$0.56 to -$0.67 vs. -$0.51. [PR]

Earnings: Wednesday After Close

• Bed Bath & Beyond (BBBY): Q2 EPS of $0.46 in-line. Revenue of $1.85B (+4.9%) in-line. [PR, Earnings call transcript]
• Nike (NKE): Q2 EPS of $1.03 beats by $0.11. Revenue of $5.4B vs. $5.19B. [PR]
• Paychex (PAYX): FQ1 EPS of $0.41 in-line. Revenue of $534M (+5.3%) vs. $540M. [PR]
• Red Hat (RHT): Q2 EPS of $0.20 beats by $0.02. Revenue of $164M (+29.2%) in-line. Shares +5.1%. [PR]

Today's Markets

• Shanghai was Asia's lone standout, +3.64% to 2,297. Nikkei -0.9% to 12,007. Hang Seng -0.15% to 18,934. BSE -1.11% to 13,541.
• In Europe, markets are mainly higher at midday. London -0.02%. Paris +0.9%. Frankfurt +0.8%.
• Futures have pared earlier gains following GE's weak outlook. Dow +0.36%. S&P +0.1%. Nasdaq +0.6%.
• Crude -1.04% to $104.63. Gold -0.54% to $890.20.
• 30-year bonds -0.37%. 10-year notes -0.26%. 5-year -0.24%. 2-year -0.15%.

Thursday's Economic Calendar

• 8:30 Durable Goods Orders
  8:30 Jobless Claims
  10:00 New Home Sales
  10:35 EIA Natural Gas Report
  11:00 Kansas City Fed Mfg Survey
  12:00 PM Fed's Bernanke testifies in Congress
  4:30 PM Money Supply
• Notable earnings before Thursday's open: DFS, MKC, RAD
• Notable earnings after Thursday's close: ACN, FINL, RIMM, TIBX

Seeking Alpha editor Rachael Granby contributed to this post.

Get Wall Street Breakfast by email -- it's free and takes only seconds to sign up.

After you finish reading Wall Street BreakfastSeeking Alpha's Market Currentswill keep you current all day long.

Comments

[RIGRNR281:]

ty,ty, for having "have ur say" feature. sincerely,,, other sites simply do not care what their readers have to say,,
specifically i am refering to news sites, who could care less if a reader has a comment, on what, to me, is a biased "reporter"

2008 Sep 25 08:03 AM

[Jersey:]

Regardless of what Sen. Obama instigates, Main St. ought to be more concerned about what it has to lose should Sec. Paulson's plan not be approved instead of what it can get out of the plan if it is approved.

2008 Sep 25 08:22 AM

[axelrod608:]

The most inexplicable aspect of the "bailout" Congress is debating is that this nation already has a system to deal with insolvent businesses - bankruptcy court - which has been around a very long time and which works. Ask the 10,000 Lehman employees who were put back to work this week after the Lehman bankruptcy. The company that bought Lehman assets - Barclays - rehired 10,000 employees.

So, if we already have an operational, fully functional system to deal with these types of problems, what is Congress doing with all this bailout frenzy ? let's take a closer look.

Under the bailout plan and the bankruptcy trustee, a third party would auction off assets - no gifference. In bankruptcy, the proceeds would go to creditors. In the P&B (Paulson and Bernake) plan I have yet to hear where the proceeds would go. Wouldn't paying the creditors be a good thing, especially since P&B have repeatedly made the case that their plan is to fix the credit problem ?

In bankruptcy, the court appointed trustee would keep the personnel he/she deemed necessary for the continuing operation of the company and dismiss the rest. Under the P&B plan, the officers and directors would remain and they would keep what other employees they deemed necessary. Whoa !! Do we have a difference here? Yes !! Under the P&B plan, the incompetent casino gamblers masquerading as CEO's and directors who caused the problem would be kept on at their multimillion dollar salaries (plus bonus, of course). The bankruptcy trustee would give them a pink slip entitling them to 13 weeks of unemployment. I think we're on to something here.

It would be a piece of cake to add a dozen or more judges to the bankruptcy system to handle the additional demand. The cost would be recaptured in the asset auctions. More responsible companies with stronger balance sheets and more conservative executives would buy up the assets of the insolvent companies and put them back to work. And they wouldn't play Lotto with their shareholders' funds.

Let me put it bluntly, for a Congressman or Senator to not recognize that we already have in place a fully functional system designed to do exactly what the "bailout" proposes to do implies that our leaders either have a double digit IQ or a six digit bribe (campaign contribution)being paid by these same financial companies. Or that they are just plain ignorant.

P&B are trying to keep a bunch of incompetent executives in multimillion dollar jobs (plus bonus). They are looking out for their buddies. A noble pursuit in combat, not so noble in a sea of financial trouble. Please, let's cut through all the bull, all the posturing, all the doom and gloom, all the "sky is falling" rhetoric. Will this mess cost the American citizens ? More than you know. Check your grocery bill, your electric bill, your gas bill. You're already paying for the irresponsible excess of a few irresponsible "financiers".

And the effects will be felt around the world. Already there have been food riots in many countries. Americans owe it to the themselves and the rest of their species to fix their problems. Not hide them behind a screen of smoke and mirrors and special interests and 'good old boy' networks.

This is not a crisis unless Congress makes it a crisis. Turn it over to the bankruptcy courts and give the bankruptcy courts all the resources they need to expeditiously process what needs to be done. And like I said yesterday, let the incompetent multimillion-dollar-a-... executives that got us into this mess flip burgers, not CDS's.

2008 Sep 25 08:35 AM

[notsosmart:]

never happen.those in power take care of themselves almost 100%.thats what got us into this mess.

2008 Sep 25 09:14 AM

[life:]

axelrod 608, my friend complete agree with you, the problem was short regulation from the government, so what was impossible to do for terrorist , mr president do in few years, he destroy our country

2008 Sep 25 09:19 AM

[The Dark Years:]

I have no sympathy for the Fuld's of the world, and I think the comment about not knowing "what it is like on the 31st floor unless you have been there" is absurd. Contrast if you will the difficulties of being on the ground in combat as a platoon leader who gets paid fifty grand a year at best with any of the Wall Street wonders who earn in the millions, sometimes in a week or two. Americans, and I think most people anywhere resent excessive compensation for jobs that many of the little people could do. That people like Fuld have great economic success is largely due to "right place, right time", old boy associations, insider club, controlled, compliant boards, etc.and so on. The point is that if you can walk away with ten, fifteen, or fifty million for a couple of years of being in the "hot seat" there is no other compensation due you in the form of sympathy or understanding by anyone for how hard the job actually is.

2008 Sep 25 09:24 AM

[captainjohann:]

Bush knows, macain knows, they are on way out.so they want to milk the system till it has suckers.

2008 Sep 25 09:43 AM

[hanson001:]

axelrod608: "In the P&B (Paulson and Bernake) plan I have yet to hear where the proceeds would go. Wouldn't paying the creditors be a good thing, especially since P&B have repeatedly made the case that their plan is to fix the credit problem ? "

The tax payers, like always, are the creditors. The proceeds, depending on how the reverse auction turns out, could be a good investment. Don't get me wrong. I am for the free-hand no matter what. My belief is that great stress is the only way to change behavior.

axelrod608: "It would be a piece of cake to add a dozen or more judges to the bankruptcy system to handle the additional demand. The cost would be recaptured in the asset auctions. More responsible companies with stronger balance sheets and more conservative executives would buy up the assets of the insolvent companies and put them back to work. And they wouldn't play Lotto with their shareholders' funds."

This problem is global and I believe we are close to a run on the banks. The behavior in the money market accounts and the t-bill yields should give you a clue. People, smartly, have no confidence in the system. Too many lies, too much greed, too many people with great dept levels crying about the government having the same problem. Wow! We have a very sick culture.

Our sin nature makes me collect ammo.

2008 Sep 25 09:48 AM

[Jon T:]

axelrod608: dealing with ONE Lehman Bros is fine.

So you're happy to sit on your hands and wait and see what happens when the domino effect takes down, not two or three or ten, but three hundred banks around the world...?

Then, your arguments and excuses will no doubt start with: "In hindsight..."

The situation is very serious and the precipice pretty dam close. It ain't politics, it's Confidence with a capital C.

2008 Sep 25 09:58 AM

[axelrod608:]

Jon T - the domino effect has already happened. In many ways. Example - Florida's state pension plan got stuck with a bunch of Lehman stock. OOOps !!! So did most other pension plans, money market funds, etc. Honestly, do you think there is an investment entity out there that currently holds 100% of 2005 assets ? No way.

You cannot have a run on the banks if the government prohibits it. I'm not saying nothing should be done. What I'm saying is that what's done should be done to protect and preserve what's left, not to enrich the folks who created the problem. The P&B plan is designed to preserve and protect the status quo. The tidal wave of liquidity is designed to bail out the perps, the ones who engineered this mess in the first place.

P&B are right in one respect - the magnitude of what is about to happen is enormous. There are over 1,000 Trillion dollars of face value derivatives all around the world. Let's say the US - at the epicenter of this foolishness - has half, 500 trillion. And lets say, conservatively that the loss is 12%. - a mere 60 Trillion.

Anyone who thinks the paltry 700 B P&B plan is going to fix this is , er. overly optimistic. Foolish perhaps.

There's one more aspect to bankruptcy that I did not note earlier - in bankruptcy, forensic accountants would go over the books to find improper tranactions. I suspect this is another important reason why the insolvent fincos want to create an alternative to bankrupcy like the P&B plan. To keep their officers and directors out of jail.

Nobody, myself included, has all the answers. There is NO plan or program that will make this mess alright. Japan did this 19 years ago and is still in recession. Never recovered. Anyone who thinks "the economy will turn around soon" is just not paying attention.

My objection to the P&B plan is simple - it is business as usual. Same players, only a few of the rules changed. And P&B want to keep the game going. The perps have lost all the stockholders' money, they now want to play the game with MY/OUR money. It is business as usual that got us here. You don't honestly think the perps are going to do anything different do you ? Example - when Bernanke opened the discount window, Lehnam grabbed a bunch and gave it out as bonuses. I want people who do this kind of stuff taken out of the game.

The people running our nation's fincos make Bonnie and Clyde look like a pair of social workers. You cannot seriously want these people getting access to federal funds.

The P&B plan is a bailout of the people and institutions that got us here. The bankruptcy system would eliminate the people and institutions that are/were the worst offenders. There is a huge difference.

Finally, P T Barnum said it best, "you can fool all the people some of the time, some of the people all the time. But you can't fool all the people all the time". The administration of George II has fooled most of the people most of the time. And I see the P&B plan as his parting "gift", not to "we the sheeple", but to the big money special interests.

If you are in favor of the P&B plan all I can say is good luck. You're going to need it.

2008 Sep 25 11:09 AM

[hanson001:]

axelrod6008: If I could have my way, the people that helped create this problem would have zero assets. That would mean that a great deal of the world's population would have no roof over their head. The plan that's in front of Congress is the government attempting to preserve what is left.

The government will not allow a run on the banks? Yeah, like the Great Depression, when we had bank holidays, after the damage was done. And the French government couldn't stop the bastille coming down, eventhough they said don't do that. One could argue the run has already begun with Bearns Stearns and Lehman. The government always acts after the infection has taken hold.

2008 Sep 25 12:09 PM

[theblueamer...:]

Have some faith. The sun will come up tomorrow. Yes, the taxpayers will be paying the bill but I bet a few years down the road it will be seen as the right way to go. I think P & B get it that if there isn't a pay off for Main Street then there won't be a pay off for Wall Street. P has not done a good job of selling it but when the final deal of the bail out is all worked out, it will not make anybody happy at first but down the road it will have been the seen as the right thing that did get done. N obody likes to take medicine but they all like what it does.

2008 Sep 25 12:28 PM

[bbowen7:]

Newsflash for Lawrence Yun of the National Association of Realtors: The housing industry will not return to normal growth until the excesses in prices and quantity caused by 20 years of easy money have worked their way through the system. We are arguing about the mechanics of the financial side of it, but that is what will happen as the laws of economics once again triumph.

2008 Sep 25 12:40 PM

[wallyjm:]

when nixon went off a gold backed currency this is the final result of fiscal irrresponsibilty. fiat money.

2008 Sep 25 01:24 PM

[jrheintz:]

axelrod608; is right on the mark but, short of labeling our Washington friends as slick.
Quite obvious Georgell is not equiped to handle those finnace boys from wall street, they sure got one over on the good old boys from Texas.

Another fact, never trust that politician who wants to represent you in congress, his memory will fail after the election. JQPublic will be left holding the bag.

axelrod608 also on the money by stating bankrupcy as being the vehicle to solve this problem, the truth will surface during the process and ther will be people going to jail.

Lets all start beating that same drum. We need to be heard!

2008 Sep 25 03:29 PM

[woodsey:]

I still hear people talking "free market" which has come to mean "anything goes". I have talked to people who went through the mortgage loan process, and what they were urged to do was criminal. Now we are urged to pour 700 B of gasoline on the fire, and it is said to be medicine. I say it is arson.

2008 Sep 25 03:31 PM

[axelrod608:]

-jr - "Quite obvious Georgell is not equiped to handle those finnace boys from wall street, they sure got one over on the good old boys from Texas."

That is not my take. I see this as yet another in a string of "crises" George II is using to put yet another one over on the sheeple and the Congress at the expense of the taxpayers. Patriot Act, WMD, attack Iraq, all presented to the Congress and the American people with the same hurry up, we gotta do this now, can't wait and if you're opposed you're unpatriotic. Bush acts like a hick, but he's not a dummy. You don't get an MBA from an Ivy League School if you're a dummy. Congress will wring their hands, talk tough and pass some poorly planned piece of legislation that few if any of them will read before voting on it.

This is not news. I started shorting Fannie and Freddy over two years ago. Lots of people knew and many have been talking about the coming debt crisis. EMPIRE OF DEBT has been out for years. The rush to try to fix this quick, now, is just George II's parting scam. Payback for years of campaign contributions, etc. It is the systemic version of Enron.

2008 Sep 25 04:56 PM