Reuters, quoting sources familiar with the matter, has reported that Boeing (NYSE: BA) is very close to clinch a huge deal from South Korea. The Company’s bid of $7.4 billion to supply South Korea with 60 fighter jets was only the offer which below the price ceiling set out by the nation’s arm procurement agency. The final decision regarding the procurement will be made in September but these sources said that the U.S. aircraft manufacturer’s bid was very likely to win them the contract. Boeing’s latest fighter jet, F-15Silent Eagle was pitted against Eurofighter consortium’s Typhoon and Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Stealth aircraft.
Category: Large Cap Growth Stocks
Microsoft Patent Sale: Judge Rejects Lawsuit Against AOL
A federal judge on Monday rejected a lawsuit against AOL Inc. (NYSE: AOL). Litigants in this case had accused AOL and some of its executives for fraud. They said that the company deliberately bought 14.8 million shares in 2011, keeping investors in dark about its plans to sell $1 billion worth patents to Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) few months later. Litigants said that they suffered substantial losses as they sold shares before the patent deal. Following the deal, the stock had surged 43% in a single trading day. Litigants argued that both the CEO Tim Armstrong and ex-CFO Arthur Minson bought shares at discounted price and made windfall gains.
Zillow Offers Shares at 3% Discount, To Acquire StreetEasy
The real-estate listings services provider, Zillow Inc. (NASDAQ: Z) said on Monday that it will offer 5 million shares (A Class) at price of $82.00 per share, which implies a 3% discount to the stock’s closing price on Monday. Shares tumbled 7.11% to $84.74 in regular trading hours. In afterhours, shares slipped another 2.47%. The Company said that it will offer 2.5 million shares while the remaining will be offered by some Zillow’s stakeholders. Zillow said that it intends to buy its smaller rival StreetEasy for nearly $50 million in cash through these proceeds. The acquisition will allow Zillow to gain traction in the New York home shopping market.
Amazon.com Website Goes Down in the U.S., Canada
The world’s largest e-commerce platform, Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) went down for nearly 15 minutes on Monday. Users across Canada and the U.S. couldn’t gain access to the website. Despite several requests to comment over the issue, the Company did not reveal what exactly went wrong which caused rare interruption in its services. Amazon.com is spending heavily on its IT infrastructure, in particularly ramping up the server capacity to avert disruptions. On Monday, users spread from Toronto to New York received error messages on their screens when trying to access Amazon.com. Just last week, New York Times also suffered a technical glitch with its website going down for about two hours.
Samsung To Soon Launch “Galaxy Gear” Smart Watch: Financial Times
The battle to bring new high tech gadgets first is intensifying between two major players, Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) and Samsung. However, it seems that the South Korean Company is outpacing its American rival. According to Financial Times, quoting sources familiar with the matter, Samsung is set to launch its new wearable device, “Galaxy Gear” smart-watch, as early as September—just before the IFA trade show in Berlin. Apple is also working hard for its “iWatch” but sources say that the device will not be launched this year.
Yahoo Appoints Webb as a Permanent Chairman (YHOO)
Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) announced on Friday that it has appointed Maynard Webb as a permanent chairman of the Company. Webb will be replacing Fred Amoroso. The appointment comes at a time when the internet company is finding a bit difficult to boost its advertising business, a domain dominated by Google and Facebook. Webb, who served as the interim Chairman at Yahoo since April, is a veteran in the tech industry and a Silicon Valley investor. In addition, Webb has been also serving as a director at Yahoo since Feb. 2012. Webb also served as a Chief operating Officer at an e-commerce company, eBay.
Jefferies Downgrades General Mills
Jefferies downgraded General Mills (NYSE: GIS) to “underperform” from “hold” and cut its price target to $44 from $45 0n Friday. Jefferies cited weak outlook and higher valuation. The firm also slashed its outlook on first quarter EPS , FY 2014 EPS and FY2015 EPS. For the fiscal first quarter, Jefferies cut EPS outlook to 69 cents from 70 cents. For FY 2014 EPS outlook was cut to $2.85 from $2.87 while for FY 2015 it was slashed to $2.96 from $3.03. Jefferies is concerned about GIS’s volume outlook due to sharp drop in advertising and media spending in last two years.
Goldman Sachs Upgrades Pandora Media To “Buy”
Shares of Pandora Media Inc. (NYSE: P) rallied in premarket trading on Friday after the online radio streaming company’s stock was upgraded to “buy” from “neutral” by Goldman Sachs’ analyst Heath Terry. In the research report, Heath Terry cited accelerating mobile and subscription revenue for the stock upgrade. The Price target on shares was lifted to $27 from $18. Terry said that the rising trend of buying online among local companies will help Pandora to better monetize its inventory.
Wal-Mart Stores Comparable-Store Sales Down 0.3% in Q2 (WMT)
Hike in pay roll taxes and increase in gas prices seems to have taken a toll on the U.S. consumer spending. The world’s largest discount retail chain, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE: WMT) said on Thursday that comparable-store sales in the U.S. fell 0.3% in the fiscal second quarter. Analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters expected 1% gain in comparable-store-sales. For the quarter, Wal-Mart posted a profit of $4.07 billion or $1.24 a share compared to a net income of $4.02 billion or $1.18 a share. Revenue edged up 2.3% to $116.9 billion from $114.3 billion in the same quarter of last year. Wal-Mart, however, slashed its full-year outlook.
Elbit Systems Beats Wall Street’s Profit Expectation (ESLT)
Shares of Elbit Systems Ltd. (USA) (NASDAQ: ESLT) gained sharply on Tuesday after the Israeli defense equipment and unmanned aerial vehicles maker handed better-than-expected fiscal second quarter results. The Company attributed to higher sales of unmanned aerial vehicles and intelligence systems for strong performance as well as cost cutting measures. On adjusted basis, the Company reported earnings of $1.19 a share up from $1.14 a share, in the same quarter of last year. Revenue rose to $702.9 million from $676.4 million.
Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters had forecasted earnings of 87 cents a share on revenue of $686 million.