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US stock market, economy and companies update (January 25, 2013)

Contributed by Trade The News

- US equities ticked higher in the premarket after yesterday's choppy session, although some December housing data has sent equities lower mid morning. December new home sales missed expectations and the backlog of supply grew slightly, although analysts pointed out the back-month revisions meant that November new home sales grew at their fastest rate in two years. Currently the DJIA is up 0.25%, the S&P500 is up 0.22% and the Nasdaq is up 0.36%.

- ECB disclosed that it is receiving higher amounts of LTRO repayments than expected. This caused short-term interest rates to pop higher in Europe and sent the EUR/USD to fresh 11-month highs at 1.3470. Numerous analysts revised higher their forecast for Q1 LTRO repayments from prior $200B towards the $300B area. Dealers will be looking at next week's ECB MRO operation to see whether banks are just rolling the three-year loans into three-month tenders (which has unlimited alloment) or not.

- Shares of Oshkosh are up 12% this morning after the firm crushed earnings expectations in its Q1 report and hiked its FY13 earnings outlook. The firm saw better sales and margins, and overall gross margins appeared to be up sharply on a y/y basis. Competitor NAV is up more than 4% in sympathy.

- Starbucks is up a solid 4% after only just meeting expectations in its Q1 report. Much of the upside apparently is driven by the firm's comments about good momentum in China and a reiteration of its plans to build out the China operation. In addition, the firm expects to see benefits throughout the year from easing commodity prices.

- Procter & Gamble's Q2 results beat expectations and raised its FY13 outlook. The firm reiterated its hopes for more growth overseas, although executives warned FX might become a threat to profits this year.

- Halliburton is up nearly 5% on a strong earnings report, although the firm did see a decline in North America revenue. Executives said they believe margins would bounce back in North America even as rig counts remained lower than in 2012.

- Mattress firm Tempur Pedic is up 12% and competitor Select Comfort is down 19% following earnings from both firms. TPX's results were slightly better than expected and SCSS's were worse, although both firms saw shrinking margins. Note that Tempur promised to update its FY guidance shortly after completing its acquisition of Sealy.

***Looking Ahead***
- 12:00 (FR) France Dec Net Change Jobseekers: +25.0Ke v +29.3K prior; Total Jobseekers: 3.155Me v 3.1323M prior
- 14:00 (AR) Argentina Dec Shop Center Sales Y/Y: No est v 3.2% prior

***Economic Data***
- (EU) ECB: Banks to repay €137.2B in weekly repayments of 3-year LTRO operation announces size of weekly repayments of 3-year LTRO with 278 of 523 banks participating
- (IN) India Forex Reserves w/e Jan 18th: $295.7B v $296.3B
- (RU) Russia Dec Real Retail Sales M/M: 20.8% v 20.0%e; Y/Y: 5.0% v 4.4%e
- (RU) Russia Dec Unemployment Rate: 5.3% v 5.5%e
- (RU) Russia Dec Disposable Income: 4.9% v 4.5%e
- (RU) Russia Dec Real Wages Y/Y: 0.3% v 6.8%e
- (RU) Russia Dec Investment in Productive Capacity: -0.7% v +1.0%e
- (BR) Brazil Dec Total Outstanding Loans (BRL): 2.359T v 2.304T prior; Loans M/M: 2.4% v 1.5% prior; Private Banks Lending (BRL): 1.233T v 1.220T prior; Personal Loan Default Rate: 7.9% v 7.8% prior
- (TR) Turkey Jan Industrial Confidence: 102.1 v 97.9 prior; Capacity Utilization: 72.4% v 73.6% prior
- (CA) Canada Dec Consumer Price Index M/M: -0.6% v -0.2%e; Y/Y: 0.8% v 1.2%e; Consumer Price Index: 121.2 v 121.6e
- (CA) Canada Dec CPI Core M/M: -0.6% v -0.2%e; Y/Y: 1.1% v 1.4%e
- (MX) Mexico Dec Preliminary Trade Balance: +$962M v -$936M prior
- (US) Dec New Home Sales: 369K v 385Ke