Before the bell: Techs to the rescue -- stocks poised for a reboundCitigroup (NYSE: C) was downgraded at Bank of America to Neutral from Buy. Also, CIBC analyst Meredith Whitney -- whose downgrade of Citi last week triggered a sharp drop in the stock and the retirement of CEO Charles Prince -- told the Daily Telegraph newspaper the only way forward is to carve the bank up and sell it off, because it lacks the capital to manage it.
Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) yesterday unveiled its mobile-phone strategy. It wants to break into the wireless market with a plan to create open standards for mobile phones. The search giant is teaming with several companies like Sprint Nextel (NYSE: S), Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM) and Motorola (NYSE: MOT) to develop a strategy that could make devices cheaper and give consumers more control over their phones' capabilities. Speculation that Google could announce a competing phone to Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) iPhone didn't materialize, although the company didn't say if a there is such a plan for a Gphone. GOOG shares were 1.5% higher in premarket trading.
Two home builders announced news. Hovnanian (NYSE: HOV) delivered 3,969 homes during its fourth quarter, a decrease of 19% from the same quarter a year ago as its problems continue. Beazer Homes (NYSE: BZH) said after the close yesterday that it's planning to take a $230 million fourth-quarter non-cash pre-tax charge and cut 650 positions, or 25% of its workforce. BZH shares are up nearly 3% in premarket trading.
Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) announced it will build a $500 million data center in Ireland that will support customers throughout Europe, Africa and the Middle East.
Airlines announced October traffic Monday: Delta Air Lines (NYSE: DAL) system traffic increased 6.2% from October 2006 with a capacity increase of 2.9%. UAL Corp. (NASDAQ: UAUA) October traffic fell 0.6%. U.S. Airways Group (NYSE: LCC) October traffic was down 1.5% from October 2006.
According to the Wall Street Journal, the U.S. Federal Communications Commission sent questionnaires to XM Satellite Radio Holdings Inc (NASDAQ: XMSR) and Sirius Satellite Radio Inc (NASDAQ: SIRI), which give an indication into areas where it could ask for concessions as part of any satellite-radio merger approval.
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