A preview of the agenda next week --- Bob (fast)
NYSE --- Deb (fast)
>> taking a look at top business headlines today. sara lee cutting more than 4,000 jobs. that amounts to 3% of its work force. most of the cuts will be neighed overseas. the company is also closing five plants in an effort to consolidate its clothing production. sales from that business have fallen in the past three years. sara lee is preparing for a 40- year quota to be lifted which restricted imports of cheaper clothing. the company owns hanes and platex and legg’s brand names. three of the biggest life insurers received subpoenas from new york attorney general eliot spitzer. spitzer is looking for information from aetna, cigna and metlife on fees paid to insurance brokers. he is investigating whether brokers violated client relationships by taking fees from both insurers and clients. aetna and cigna say they’re cooperating with the investigation. other insurers, including chubb and hartford have already been subpoenaed as have marsh & mclellan and willis group. halliburton says u.s. regulators have become a formal investigation into its nigerian joint venture. the s.e.c. and justice department are looking into whether bribes were paid to win contracts for a gas liquification plant. halliburton was formerly under the control of vice president cheney. well, the markets will be closed in the u.or were closed, i should say, in observance of the passing of president reagan. we thought it would make sense to take a look at what events might be driving trade when we reopen for business next week. bob bowdon joins me with a preview of the agenda. bob?
>> thank you, matt. the biggest day next week might be tuesday when 78-year-old alan greenspan testifies at a senate confirmation hearing in search of his fifth term. richard shelby, chairman of the banking committee, says greenspan will “sail through with ease.” everybody will listen for clues on how measured interest rate hikes might be. the labor department will have a read on inflation with the may consumer price index data. economists predicting the data will show prices rose .4% in may from the month before. we have large-cap corporate earnings on tuesday. lehman brothers will kick off the brokerage group’s earnings parade. oracle is set to report fiscal fourth quarter earnings on tuesday. retailer circuit city and homebuilder lennar schedule for earnings reports. after getting that circuit city report on tuesday, then wednesday we’ll give retail investors more to chew on from best buy. analysts predict best buy’s profits grew 59% from a year ago. quite a different story from goodyear tire & rubber, set to release earnings on wednesday. goodyear will have lost money for the sixth consecutive quarter. earnings from goldman sachs and bear stearns on wednesday. wednesday will also bring may economic statistics. the federal reserve will report on may industrial production and capacity utilization of the nation’s factories. owners of homebuilding stocks will look for the commerce department report on may housing starts and building permits, all coming on wednesday. then we move to thursday of next week when we’ll get corporate earnings releases from two software companies―adobe and red hat. also hearing from carnival and j smucker. a lot on the agenda for next week. back to you.
>> as we head into the weekend, stocks editor deborah kostroun joins us to discuss what is ahead for the markets in the upcoming week. she joins us on the set as opposed to the nyse. what is on the minds? back to back four-day trading weeks which is unusual.
>> very unusual. as we get into next week, the one thing that traders focus in on and that is crude oil. they said this market is still consumed with crude oil. the reason is when crude oil moves up, the market kind of moves in tandem either way. one of the things about crude oil, just over the past week, we have lost 12% in crude oil. remember the high we saw on june 1.it was $42.45 a barrel. we closed out on thursday, $38.50 a barrel. so that is a big move in crude oil. that really has an impact on consumers as well.
>> oil stocks have been -- energy at last check is the best performing group year to date still.
>> it still is. one of the best performers for the week as well. oil service stocks they had an upgrade from u.b.s. saying oil prices likely to remain pretty high. also opec increased inventories. that’s coming to the market now. that is one of the things that traders say will likely keep a lid on crude oil prices next week because we are seeing those supplies.
>> i put this chart up. we can pop this thing up. this is the 10 groups in the s&p economic group. energy, consumer staples, industrials, health care and telecoms leading the way year to date. if we sort by the past five trading days. telecoms jump to the top. we have seen a switch in the leadership. 30 seconds left. sorry.
>> let’s talk about earnings real quickly. second quarter earnings, we’re focused on oil right now. once we get to july, we’ll look at second quarter earnings. few look at second quarter earnings, what we’re expecting is an increase of 19.9%. that’s really different from what we saw on april 1. april 1 we thought we’d see an increase of 14%. so we have really kind of ratcheted up the earnings expectations already for the second quarter. first quarter was really great, too.
>> good to see you here. appreciate it very much. stay with us, folks, because we take a look at housing boom. some thinking it might be grinding to a halt. we try to put those fears aside for now.
