Specialized Finance

Greece is being pressured to sell assets so that the bailout terms can be revised more favorably, as the country struggles under a mountain of debt. I wonder if I can buy an island for $1. Sony Corp. (NYSE: SNE) said it resumed partial operation of its PlayStation Network and Qriocity...

Cusick's Corner The EU is still bogging down stocks and technically the challenge has been made to the Bulls. At this juncture this does not mean it's a trend change. The overall trend to the upside is intact unless there are some larger headlines (i.e. EU debt or Retail getting hit). The...

ETF Securities, the ETF issuer most known for its offerings backed by holdings of precious metals, issued a statement today saying that its ETFS Physical Silver Trust (NYSE: SIVR), the primary rival to the iShares Silver Trust (NYSE: SLV), traded a record 5.25 million shares on May 5. That...

CNinsure Inc (NASDAQ: CISG) shares moved up 29.94% to $17.10 at 10:30 am. The volume of CISG shares traded was 1031% higher than normal. CISG's Board of Directors received a preliminary non-binding going private proposal. SIGA Technologies Inc (NASDAQ: SIGA) shares rose 5.00% to $14.90. The volume...

Orthovita Inc. (VITA) agreed to be acquired by Stryker Corp. (SYK) for a $3.85 a share in cash in a deal valued at $316 million. Lowe's Cos. (LOW) estimated that for the fiscal second quarter ending July 29, it would earn 65 cents to 69 cents a share on 4% higher total sales and 2% higher same-...

J.C. Penney Company (JCP) Penney Beats With Q1 EPS, Guidance Mixed - Shares trending in the pre market up $2.00 on 200k shares and trading at Sept 2008 highs.  NYSE Euronext (NYX) The NASDAQ OMX Group (NDAQ) Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) Pulling out of the bidding process NYX down $4 pre market...

Citing the fact that the companies would not get regulatory approval for the bid, the NASDAQ (NASDAQ: NDAQ) and the IntercontinentalExchange (NYSE: ICE) are dropping their proposed $11 billion bid for NYSE Euronext (NYSE: NYX). Shares of NYSE Euronext are down sharply this morning, down over 10%...

ANADIGICS Inc (NASDAQ: ANAD) dipped 2.33% to $2.94 in the pre-market session. ANAD issued downbeat Q2 projections. The NASDAQ OMX Group Inc (NASDAQ: NDAQ) fell 1.90% to $26.40 in the pre-market session. NDAQ and IntercontinentalExchange (NYSE: ICE) withdraw their proposed $11 billion offer for...

CME Group (NYSE: CME) today announced the launch of post-execution clearing services for over-the-counter U.S. dollar/Chilean peso non-deliverable forwards through CME ClearPort.

The NASDAQ OMX Group, Inc. (NDAQ) and IntercontinentalExchange (ICE) today announced that following discussions with the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, they are withdrawing the joint proposal they made in April, 2011 to acquire NYSE Euronext and will not commence the exchange...

Rambus Inc. (RMBS), a premier technology licensing company, is trading at a price of $15.83, a dramatic change of -17.85%. Currently, the company has a Market capitalization (total value of a company in the stock market) of approximately 1.70B HEALTHY COFFEE INTL (HCEI) is trading at a price of $...

The Management and Supervisory Boards of Deutsche Börse AG recommend acceptance of the offer made by Alpha Beta Netherlands Holding N.V. Combination of Deutsche Börse and NYSE Euronext (NYSE: NYX) creates the world's premier global exchange group Superior value creation through enhanced growth...

PayMate, a US-based mobile payments company, and IFMR Rural Finance, a subsidiary of the nonprofit Institute for Financial Management and Research (IFMR), recently announced an agreement to launch a suite of financial inclusion projects through IFMR's microfinance institution (MFI) Kshetriya Gramin...

Anyone that pays even scant attention to financial markets by now knows that the CME Group (NYSE: CME) has been wielding its margin-raising sword with almost wanton abandon in the past couple of weeks. Five margin increases on silver in the past two weeks mean the initial margin requirement for...

According to Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, Asta Funding (NASDAQ: ASFI) reported fiscal 2Q11 EPS ROCK: [$0.19, $0.19, NM, $0.16]. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods said that operating earnings were higher than the estimate primarily due to higher revenues than it had forecasted. “Raising EPS estimates.”...