By Pady Power

Fed’s Hoenig said that there is still significant weakness to work through in the US economy. (RTRS) Also, Fed’s Dudley said the central bank could curtail the risk of future liquidity crises by providing a “backstop” to solvent firms with sufficient collateral. (BBG)

The Obama administration is leaning towards extending the troubled asset relief programme into next year, retaining part of the $700bn war chest in case of another financial emergency. (FT)

Wall Street

Exxon Mobil – Shares in co. could rise more than 20% to USD 90 next year if energy prices increase as expected, Barron’s reported on Sunday. (Barron’s)

Caterpillar – Co. has warned that if Congress presses ahead with plans to curb the use of “over the counter” derivatives, U.S. manufacturers could be hurt from contributing to the economic recovery and may not be able to create jobs. Clay Thompson, co.’s head of government affairs, said that the plans would have a big impact on the company’s working capital and the ability to grow the company would be affected. (FT)

Boeing – Chairman of Emirates Airline said co. is discussing new plane orders with co. and rival Airbus which could number in the “tens of planes”. Co. said it sees “tremendous” growth for Middle East markets and sees requirement for 1,710 new planes over 20 years worth over USD 300bln. In other news, has completed installing reinforcements within the side-of-body section of two more 787 Dreamliners and is still set to have the first flight of its long-delayed Dreamliner 787 aircraft by the end of the year. (RTRS/BBG/Sources/FT)

General Electric – Co. and France-based Vivendi held talks over the weekend about valuing Vivendi’s stake in NBC Universal. In other news, co.’s Aviation unit and AVIC Systems of China announce agreement on forming a new joint venture co to develop and market integrated avionics systems for commercial aircraft customers. (NY Post/WSJ)

Hewlett Packard – Co. is not done shopping following its USD 3.1bln play for 3Com, PE Hub reports. Shaw Wu of Kaufman Brothers said that said Brocade is now an unlikely HP Target following the 3Com deal, and Juniper would be expensive. But he mentioned more “specialist” networking names such as F5 Networks and Riverbed Technology. (PE Hub)

Coca – Cola – Co. plans to invest USD 6bln in Brazil by 2014, doubling the amount it poured into the country over the past five years. (O Globo)

Companies paying dividend: Procter & Gamble (USD 0.44000)

S&P 500

Earnings

Lowe’s – Q3 EPS USD 0.23, EPS ex-impairment and tax gain USD 0.24, vs. Exp. USD 0.24. Q3 revenue USD 11.4bln vs. Exp. USD 11.268bln, co. sees Q4 EPS USD 0.09-0.13 vs. Exp. USD 0.10. Q3 comp. sales down 7.5%. Co. sees Q4 total sales essentially unchanged and sees Q4 same-store sales down 2%-6%. (BBG/RTRS)

Other News

JP Morgan – The bank is to buy out the remaining 50% of Cazenove for GBP 950mln. (Sunday Times)

Citigroup – Co. said that it is selling its controlling stake in Japan’s leading call centre operator, Bellsystem24, to private equity firm Bain Capital Partners in a deal that values the operation at USD 1.1bln. In other news, hedge fund billionaire John Paulson’s co. took a stake in co. while cutting holdings in Bank of America and its interest in Goldman Sachs according to a regulatory filing. (AP/RTRS)

Bank of America – Co. search for a new chief executive has been hurt by federal pay limits that played a major role in the senior vice chairman of PNC Financial Services Group Inc spurning feelers from the company, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday. (WSJ)

Merck – At the American Heart Association meeting, co. said it is confident in the safety and efficacy profiles of Zetia and Vytorin, and issued the following comment in response to misinterpretation of results from a small 200-patient imaging study called Arbiter 6. “The results of the small Arbiter 6 study do not, in any way, change our view of Zetia and Vytorin as effective medicines for fighting high LDL cholesterol.” (theflyonthewall.com)

Eli Lilly – Results from a new study showed patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus who also had coronary artery disease and received a 60 mg loading dose and 10 mg maintenance dose of co.’s Effient achieved significantly greater platelet inhibition compared with a 600 mg loading dose and 150 mg maintenance dose of Plavix. (theflyonthewall.com)

Bristol-Myers – Co. announced it will split off its holdings in Mead Johnson Nutrition Company. The co. expects the split-off to be a tax-advantaged way to further deliver value to co.’s shareholders. The split-off is expected to be net cash flow positive to the BioPharma business and accretive to earnings per share beginning in 2010. (BBG)

Abbot Laboratories – Results from the investigator-initiated ARBITER 6 – HALTS study showed patients at high cardiovascular risk had significant regression of atherosclerosis after 8 and 14 months of therapy with co.’s Niaspan plus a statin, the study’s primary endpoint. In a pre-specified secondary endpoint of the study, treatment with Niaspan plus statin also resulted in significantly fewer major adverse cardiac events, as compared to ezetimibe plus a statin. (theflyonthewall.com)

Capital ONE – Co.’s domestic card annualised net charge off rate 9.04% in October, domestic card 30 days + delinquency rate 5.72% in October. (RTRS)

FedEx – Co. shares, which have more than doubled since a low in March, may climb further given the delivery company’s growing exposure to overseas markets such as China, Barron’s reported on Sunday. (Barron’s)

Devon Energy – Co. to sell all Gulf of Mexico, intl assets and sees proceed of USD 4.5-7.5bln. Co. says sees deal adding to earnings starting 2011 and sees deal adding to production starting 2011. (BBG)

Constellation Energy – Co announced that it has entered into a new USD 350mln reserve-based revolving credit facility with a syndicate of lenders that includes The Royal Bank of Scotland plc as administrative agent, BNP Paribas and The Bank of Nova Scotia as joint lead arrangers and co-syndication agents, together with Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. and Societe Generale. (briefing.com)

Illinois Tool Works – Co. reports an 18% decrease in operating revenues for three months ended October 31, 2009. Co. says sees Q4 EPS cont. ops. USD 0.54 – USD 0.66 vs. Exp. USD 0.64 and sees Q4 revenue down 1% to up 5% vs. Q3. (BBG)

Ford – Co. says November sales at least as strong as October according to co.’s sales analyst. (Detroit News)

Best Buy/Gap – Some retailers such as Best Buy and Gap could report a surprising uptick in profits over the holiday season after cutting costs and trimming inventories to better benefit from the holiday sales boost, Barron’s said on Sunday. Barron’s writes that shares of Best Buy/Gap are undervalued and could rally on improving results. (Barron’s)

Companies paying dividend: Paychex (USD 0.31000), Texas Instruments (USD 0.11000)

Companies going ex-dividend: Aflac Corp (USD 0.28000), Marathon Oil (USD 0.24000)

NASDAQ

Apple – Co. has won an important round in its legal battle against Psystar Corp., which sells computers based on the Apple Macintosh operating system. Co. first accused Psystar of copyright infringement in a lawsuit filed in July 2008, which was about four months after Psystar began selling its machines. In other news, co. approached AdMob about an acquisition a few weeks before AdMob agreed to a USD 750mln offer from Google. Furthermore, Co. is reportedly seeking a patent for technology that displays advertising on nearly everything that has a screen, including computers, televisions, Game devices and computer electronics. (WSJ/BBG/NY Times)

Google – The Swiss data protection watchdog is taking the co. to the country’s Federal Administrative Court over an alleged failure to protect people’s privacy on its Street View website, two months after the service launched in Switzerland. Also, in an American legal filing made close to midnight on Friday, co. and its publishing allies set out their latest proposals for a plan that will allow the company to distribute millions of books online. (FT/Sunday Times)

Intel – Co. CFO, Stacy Smith, said the chipmaker is on track to meet its Q4 outlook and said a recovery in corporate spending on PCs could happen in the next 18 months. In other news, co. reports 12.5% boost in cash dividend. (Business Times/BBG)

Cisco – Co. announced a revised recommended voluntary cash offer to acquire Tandberg. Under the revised terms, co. will offer to purchase all the outstanding shares of Tandberg for 170 Norwegian Kroner per share for an aggregate purchase price of approximately $3.4B. Cisco will also increase the interest payable on the offer price to a rate of 3.00% from a rate of 1.75%. This revised offer represents Cisco’s final price for this transaction. (BBG/RTRS)

OTHER NEWS

Baltic Dry bulk index rises 2.7% to 4,220 at 1318 GMT (0718 CST) in London. (BBG) USD Index down 0.1% and CRB Index up 0.68% at 1359 GMT (0759 CST)

In a preliminary review of its third quarter foreclosure prevention data in the Florida housing market, Citi today announced its activities in the Sunshine State successfully helped distressed homeowners avoid potential foreclosure at nearly three times the rate of a year ago. New third quarter data shows that Citi’s loss mitigation successes in the state outnumbered foreclosures completed by a ratio of almost 16 to one compared to almost six to one in the third quarter of 2008. Citi manages a USD 750 billion mortgage portfolio of loans it owns or services. (Yahoo Finance)

Regulators shut down two banks in Florida and one in California on Friday, boosting to 123 the number of US bank failures this year as loan defaults rise in the worst financial climate in decades. (AP)

GM – Co. will begin paying back USD 6.7bln in US government loans by the end of 2009 and could pay off full amount by 2011, four years ahead of schedule, according to a person familiar with the matter. Also, co. reports Q3 revenue USD 28bln vs. consensus of USD 22.89bln. Also of note, co. sees 2010 US market total vehicles 11-12mln units and sees Q3 global share 11.9%. Co. sees modest growth in 2010 and co.’s CEO says sees some encouraging signs in Q3 results but not satisfied with the loss. (AP/BBG)

The Obama administration is leaning towards extending the troubled asset relief programme into next year, retaining part of the USD 700bn war chest in case of another financial emergency. (FT)

Spot Gold hit a record high above USD 1,130 an ounce when massive buying in US Gold futures boosted
bullion’s appeal. Investors maintained their appetite for Gold as a hedge against currencies as the USD drifted
lower in Asia, extending falls from late last week. In other news, Central banks will be net buyers of Gold this year as they diversify away from the USD, according to investment fund BlackRock. Also in news, the world’s top Gold mining companies have warned global production of the precious metal is likely to resume a long-term decline in coming years. (RTRS/FT)

Fed’s Evans sees ‘highly accommodative policy for ‘quite’ some time but is ‘confident’ Fed could shift to ‘more restrictive policy’ when time right. (BBG/RTRS)
Evans sees 3% GDP growth over next 18 months core inflation at 1.5% for ‘next few years’, while unemployment likely to rise for 2 quarters. Says Fed mulling how to engineer reserve management tools, committee has different perspectives. In other news, Fed’s Dudley said the Central Bank could curtail the risk of future liquidity crises by providing a “backstop” to solvent firms with sufficient collateral.

Japanese GDP Annualised (Q3 P) Y/Y 4.8% vs. Exp. 2.9% (Prev. 2.3%, Rev. to 2.7%) (BBG)
Japan’s economy grew at the fastest pace in more than two years in the third quarter as stimulus lifted consumer spending and capital spending rose, but analysts say growth will slow as falling wages reduce the lure of subsidies on cars and electronics.