Stocks are opening slightly lower, a day after the market had its best day in two and a half years.
Another rise in applications for unemployment benefits last week set a negative tone on Wall Street. The increase is a sign of weakness in the labor market because people are still being laid off.
Minutes after the opening bell Thursday, the Dow Jones industrial average was down 29 points, or 0.2 percent, at 12,016.
The Dow had soared 490 the day before, its biggest gain since March 2009, after central banks around the world slashed borrowing costs to shore up the global financial system installment payday loans.
The S&P 500 was down 4, or 0.3 percent, at 1,243. The Nasdaq fell 7, or 0.3 percent, to 2,613.
Will my flight still operate?
ST. LOUIS
Efforts to clean up areas near Bangkok that were flooded as much as a yard (meter) deep just two weeks ago are gaining pace as the threat of inundation of the Thai capital eases.
Hundreds of volunteers joined monks in gathering flood detritus into garbage bags Tuesday near the massive temple that houses the Dhammakaya Buddhist sect in Pathum Thani province, just north of Bangkok.
Businesses in unaffected parts of central Bangkok are removing their sandbag barriers as it becomes clear that floodwaters have been diverted east and west of the center of the city low fee cash advance.
Since July, more than a fifth of the country’s 64 million people have been affected by the worst flooding in more than 50 years, leaving at least 606 people dead.
Whether people celebrate or criticize Occupy Wall Street, the movement has reinvigorated calls for local buying just in time for the manic holiday shopping season.
Buying local and American-made became a battle cry for some in the movement that blames big business greed for shuttering American operations and shipping those jobs overseas.
“Some people talk about buying local and not supporting large chain stores, but really I think we want to encourage people to think consciously about where they shop,” said Zach Chasnoff, 33, of south St. Louis.
Chasnoff has wielded a bullhorn at a few Occupy St. Louis rallies, though he said he couldn’t speak as a representative of a movement. He said he’d been waiting for an opportunity to ignite this particular discussion.
Chasnoff owns a house painting business that fluctuates from two to seven employees during his busy season. When the bottom fell out of the economy in 2008, he was virtually unemployed for about seven months and didn’t know if he’d keep his house, he said. Meanwhile, bank bailouts and news of continued executive bonuses infuriated him. He blames greed for companies’ transferring jobs overseas and cheap foreign goods for undercutting American-made items.
Many economists challenge that logic, saying that free trade ultimately benefits the U.S.
“It feels almost anti-patriotic to buy goods made elsewhere right now. You are perpetuating the loss of manufacturing jobs,” Chasnoff said, echoing long-standing protests by some against, for instance, buying foreign cars.
Buying local, on the other hand, puts consumers, not corporations, in control, he said.
Would it work?
Steve Farazzi, a professor of economics at Washington University, said that the wage disparity concerns at the root of the Occupy Wall Street movement wouldn’t be solved by shopping at boutiques and farmers markets.
“I’d have a hard time telling people that their holiday shopping patterns will have an important impact on income distribution,” Farazzi said.
If globalization has killed American jobs and driven down wages, then the tool to combat the trend would be higher wages in emerging markets such as China, not necessarily closing operations there. China’s extremely cheap labor is the problem for American workers, not the fact that Chinese workers have jobs formerly held by Americans, Farazzi explained.
Rising global wages would level the playing field for American workers, he said, and it would increase the demand for all goods if we have more people who can afford to buy. But Farazzi acknowledged that a push to boost wages for Chinese workers
Royal Ahold NV, the Dutch owner of U.S. supermarket chains Giant and Stop & Shop, reported a 5 percent rise in operating profit for the third quarter, as growth in the U.S. offset a decline in the Netherlands.
Overall operating profit rose to euro300 million ($405 million), and sales were up 2.5 percent to euro6.86 billion. Net profit was up 15 percent to euro257 million ($346 million), but strongly affected by one-time items.
Margins were about unchanged overall, though the company’s performance differed sharply in the U.S. and the Netherlands.
Chief Executive Dick Boer said the company won market share in both markets. In the U.S., Ahold pursues a strategy of offering relatively low prices and relatively decent quality, which it sums up as “value for money.”
“Customers remain cautious in their spending and focus on value in an inflationary environment,” he said in a statement Thursday.
U.S. sales rose 8.5 percent to $5.8 billion, and operating margins improved to 4.1 percent of sales from 3.7 percent as the company was more than able to pass on price increases to customers. Operating profit rose $41 million to $237 million.
In the Netherlands, where Ahold operates the dominant Albert Heijn chain, the company trimmed prices and sacrificed margins in order to add to its lead as the country’s largest retailer. Sales rose 4.5 percent to euro2.3 billion, but operating margins fell to 6 cash till payday advance.4 percent from 7.1 percent and operating profit actually declined by euro7 million to euro149 million.
Albert Heijn offers top-quality produce at above-average prices.
SNS Securities analyst Richard Withagen said in a note that Ahold’s performance was better than expected, especially in the U.S., but he repeated a Hold recommendation on the shares.
The net profit figure was hit by a Nov. 4 New York Supreme Court ruling that Ahold disclosed in a footnote. Ahold said as a result of the ruling, it had taken a charge of euro94 million to resolve a lease dispute with a former subsidiary that will impact earnings through 2031. Ahold said it would appeal the ruling, though it was not immediately clear what higher court it could appeal to.
Ahold offset the charge with a tax windfall: it released a euro109 million provision it has been holding to resolve a tax issue it says dates from before 2004. The company did not say why it chose to book the gain this quarter, though it made the company’s bottom line appear more or less in line with its operating results, rather than showing a large loss.
Shares were up 1.2 percent to euro9.53 in volatile early trading in Amsterdam.
Hundreds of police officers in riot gear raided the Occupy Wall Street encampment in New York City in the pre-dawn darkness Tuesday, evicted hundreds of demonstrators and demolished the tent city that was the epicenter of a movement protesting what participants call corporate greed and economic inequality.
The police action began around 1 a.m. and lasted several hours as officers with plastic shields and batons pushed the protesters from their base at Zuccotti Park. Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said around 200 people were arrested, including dozens who tried to resist the eviction by linking arms in a tight circle at the center of the park. A member of the City Council was among those arrested during the sweep.
Tents, sleeping bags and equipment were carted away, and by 4:30 a.m., the park was empty. It wasn’t clear what would happen next to the demonstration, though the new enforcement of rules banning tents, sleeping bags or tarps would effectively end an encampment that started in mid-September.
“At the end of the day, if this movement is only tied to Liberty Plaza, we are going to lose. We’re going to lose,” said Sandra Nurse, one of the organizers, referring to the park by the nickname the demonstrators have given it. “Right now the most important thing is coming together as a body and just reaffirm why we’re here in the first place.”
Hundreds of protesters marched through lower Manhattan as the workday began, chanting and looking for a new space to gather. A state court judge called an 11:30 a.m. hearing on the legality of the eviction, following an emergency appeal by the National Lawyers Guild, and issued a temporary restraining order barring the city from preventing protesters from re-entering the park.
As of midmorning, though, the park remained surrounded by police barricades and officers keeping everyone out. A few dozen demonstrators sat on the sidewalk just outside the police line, waiting. In the meantime, workers used power washers to blast the plaza clean.
The surprise action came two days short of the two-month anniversary of the encampment. Mayor Michael Bloomberg said he ordered the sweep because health and safety conditions and become “intolerable” in the crowded plaza.
“From the beginning, I have said that the city has two principal goals: guaranteeing public health and safety, and guaranteeing the protesters’ First Amendment rights,” he said. “But when those two goals clash, the health and safety of the public and our first responders must be the priority.”
He said that people would be allowed to return as soon as this morning, but that the city would begin enforcing the rules set up by the park’s private owners banning camping equipment.
That left demonstrators wondering what to do next. There was talk among some Tuesday of trying to occupy another park or plaza, but there are no immediate plans to do so, Nurse said.
The eviction began in the dead of night, as police officers arrived by the hundreds and set up powerful klieg lights to illuminate the block.
Officers handed out notices from Brookfield Office Properties, the park’s owner, and the city saying that the plaza had to be cleared because it had become unsanitary and hazardous. A commander announced over a bullhorn that everyone had to leave. Many did, carrying their belongings with them. Others tried to make a stand, even chaining themselves together with bicycle locks.
In contrast to the scene weeks ago in Oakland, where a similar eviction turned chaotic and violent, the police action was comparatively orderly. But it wasn’t entirely bloodless.
“The cops hit my legs with a baton,” said demonstrator Max Luisdaniel Santos, 31, an unemployed construction worker, pulling up his pants to show some swollen scars on his calf. “Then they shoved my face into the ground.”
He pulled open his cheek to show where his teeth had cut into the flesh as he hit the stone paving payday advance lenders.
“I was bleeding profusely. They shoved a lot of people’s faces into the ground,” Santos said as he stood near the park Tuesday morning, looking shaken. He said he lost his shoes in the scuffle, but wasn’t arrested.
One person was taken to a hospital for evaluation because of breathing problems.
City Councilman Ydanis Rodriguez, who has been supportive of the Occupy movement, was among those arrested outside of the park. Kelly, the police commissioner, said he was trying to get through police lines to reach the protesters.
Protesters were able to grab about $2,500 in cash that was at the plaza before police kicked them out, said Pete Dutro, who is in charge of the New York City movement’s finances.
“We got all the dough,” Dutro said. “It’s on my person.”
Bloomberg said the evacuation was conducted in the middle of the night “to reduce the risk of confrontation in the park, and to minimize disruption to the surrounding neighborhood.”
“The law that created Zuccotti Park required that it be open for the public to enjoy for passive recreation 24 hours a day,” Bloomberg said. “Ever since the occupation began, that law has not been complied with, as the park has been taken over by protesters, making it unavailable to anyone else.”
He said the city would contest the motion filed by the National Lawyers Guild, a civil rights organization that has been representing arrested protesters.
Concerns about health and safety issues at Occupy Wall Street camps around the country have intensified, and protesters in several cities have been ordered to take down their shelters, adhere to curfews and relocate so that parks can be cleaned.
The surprise ouster at Zuccotti Park came as the movement was at its most vulnerable. A rift had been growing in recent weeks between the park’s full-time residents and the movement’s power players, most of whom no longer lived in the park.
The protesters who actually made things happen _ the ones who planned marches and rallies and set plans into motion _ held meetings in donated office space high above the park, in skyscrapers just like the ones housing the bankers they were protesting.
Some residents of Zuccotti Park have been grumbling about the recent formation of a “spokescouncil,” an upper echelon of organizers who held meetings at a high school near police headquarters. Some protesters felt that the selection of any leaders whatsoever wasn’t true to Occupy Wall Street’s original anti-government spirit: That no single person is more important or more powerful than another person.
But other protesters felt that Occupy Wall Street needed to be bigger than Zuccotti Park _ that they had, in a sense, outgrown it.
Occupy encampments have come under fire around the country and even overseas as local officials and residents have complained about possible health hazards and ongoing inhabitation of parks and other public spaces.
Anti-Wall Street activists intend to converge at the University of California, Berkeley, on Tuesday for a day of protests and another attempt to set up an Occupy Cal camp, less than a week after police arrested dozens of protesters who tried to pitch tents on campus.
The Berkeley protesters will be joined by Occupy Oakland activists who said they would march to the UC campus in the afternoon. Police cleared the tent city in front of Oakland City Hall before dawn Monday and arrested more than 50 people amid complaints about safety, sanitation and drug use.
In London, authorities said they were resuming legal action to evict a protest camp outside St. Paul’s Cathedral after talks with the demonstrators stalled.
Tropical Storm Sean continues to strengthen as it moves to the northeast toward Bermuda.
The U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said Thursday afternoon that Sean’s maximum sustained winds are 65 mph (100 kph). It is located about 285 miles (459 kilometers) west-southwest of Bermuda and is moving northeast at 13 mph (21 kph). The storm’s center should pass to the northwest of Bermuda on Friday morning.
A tropical storm warning is in effect for Bermuda, where storm conditions are expected to begin Thursday night online payday loan lenders. Sean is expected to produce 1 inch (2.5 centimeters) to 3 inches (8 centimeters) of rainfall there. Swells generated by Sean are affecting the southeastern U.S. coast and Bermuda, with life-threatening surf and rip currents.
The Atlantic hurricane season lasts from June to the end of November.
A judge on Monday blocked a federal requirement that would have begun forcing tobacco companies next year to put graphic images on their cigarette packages to show the dangers of smoking.
U.S. District Judge Richard Leon ruled that it’s likely the cigarette makers will succeed in a lawsuit claiming the images violate the free speech amendment to the Constitution. He stopped the requirement until the lawsuit is resolved, which could take years.
Leon held a hearing on the case in September and questioned the Justice Department about whether the nine graphic images approved by the Food and Drug Administration in June convey just the facts about the health risks of smoking or go beyond that into advocacy _ a critical distinction in a case over free speech.
The images include a cloud of cigarette smoke within inches of a baby’s face; a pair of healthy lungs next to the diseased lungs of a smoker and a warning that smoking causes fatal lung disease; a smoker’s stained teeth and a lip diseased by cigarettes; and a dead smoker on an autopsy table with surgical stitches in his chest and the words “Smoking can kill you.”
The FDA requirement said the labels were to cover the entire top half of cigarette packs, front and back and include a number for a stop-smoking hotline. The labels were to constitute 20 percent of cigarette advertising, and marketers were to rotate use of the images.
The Justice Department argued the images coupled with written warnings were designed to communicate the dangers to youngsters and adults. The FDA declined to comment on the judge’s ruling.
Tobacco companies are increasingly relying on their packaging to build brand loyalty and grab consumers. It’s one of few advertising levers left to them after the government curbed their presence in magazines, billboards and TV, and the graphic labels could cost them millions in lost sales and increased packaging costs.
The cigarette makers that sued the FDA are R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. of Winston-Salem, N.C., Lorillard Tobacco Co. of Greensboro, N.C., Commonwealth Brands Inc. of Bowling Green, Ky., Liggett Group of Mebane, N.C., and Santa Fe Natural Tobacco Co. of Santa Fe, N.M.
Asian stock markets fell Tuesday as new concerns emerged about the viability of a much-heralded plan to contain Europe’s debt crisis.
Benchmark oil fell to near $92 a barrel. The dollar rose slightly against the yen, a day after jumping about 5 percent following Japan’s move to buy dollars and sell the strong yen to protect its exporters.
Japan’s Nikkei 225 index dropped 1.4 percent to 8,859.21. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng lost 1.4 percent to 19,584.69, and Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 shed 1.5 percent to 4,232.90. Benchmarks in Singapore, India and Indonesia were also down.
South Korea’s Kospi gained 0.1 percent to 1,911.39. Key indexes in Taiwan, Malaysia and Thailand also rose.
Wall Street tumbled Monday, with confidence shaken by the collapse of the brokerage house MF Global. The securities firm filed for bankruptcy protection after it was downgraded by ratings agencies for holding too much European debt.
The company’s collapse startled investors already nervous that the United States _ with an economy growing at the slowest pace since the end of the Great Recession _ is in danger of falling back into recession.
The Dow Jones industrial average spiraled down 2.3 percent to close at 11,955.01. The S&P 500 fell 2.5 percent to 1,253.30, and the Nasdaq composite fell 1.9 percent to 2,684.41.
European leaders reached an agreement Thursday aimed at shoring up the region’s banks and preventing a severe debt crunch in Greece from bringing down Europe’s financial system.
But the European debt crisis is still far from fixed. One troubling sign is that borrowing costs for Italy and Spain have increased, a signal that traders remain worried about those countries’ ability to pay their debts.
Complicating the picture further was the announcement by Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou on Monday that his debt-strapped country will hold a referendum on whether to accept the European debt deal faxless cash advances.
“That puts everything in question. No longer do you have Greece backing it,” said Andrew Sullivan, principal sales trader at Piper Jaffray in Hong Kong. “It is putting another level of uncertainty into it, and the markets don’t like uncertainty.”
Meanwhile, surveys showing China’s manufacturing remained sluggish in October also weighed on investor sentiment. Hong Kong-listed GOME Electrical Appliance Holdings, China’s largest appliances retailer, fell 5.8 percent. Anhui Conch Cement Co. fell 3.6 percent. China’s biggest steel company, Baoshan Iron & Steel Ltd., lost 0.4 percent.
But Qantas Airways rose 1.6 percent as the world’s 10-largest airline took to the skies again after a debilitating series of strikes and subsequent staff lockout were halted by an Australian court.
Negative earnings also weighed on shares.
Japanese consumer electronics giant Panasonic Corp. tumbled 4.5 percent, a day after reporting a quarterly loss and projecting a huge annual loss due to slumping TV sales and a strong yen.
Australian retailer Harvey Norman fell 3.7 percent after the company reported a drop of almost 20 percent in pre-tax earnings in the three months to September.
In energy trading, benchmark crude for December delivery was down 82 cents at $92.37 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract slipped 13 cents to settle at $93.19 in New York on Monday.
The euro fell to $1.3804 from $1.3924 late Monday in New York. The dollar rose slightly to 78.07 yen from 78.05 yen.
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