A Peek Into The Market Before The Trading Starts

Pre-open movers US stock futures are lower this morning, ahead of employment and manufacturing data. Futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 12 points to 11,520, while futures for the S&P 500 fell 1.60 points to 1,254. Futures for the Nasdaq 100 lost 1 point to 2,228. A Peek Into Global Markets Negative sentiment ruled the European markets today. While STOXX Europe 600 Index has lost 0.96%, London's FTSE 100 Index moved down 0.33%. Mostly Asian markets ended in the positive territory, with Japan's Nikkei Stock Average dropping 1.12%, Australia's S&P/ASX 200 moving up 0.31% and China's Shanghai Composite gaining 0.29%. Broker Recommendation Piper Jaffray is raising its price target on EMC Corporation EMC to $26 from $23, and is keeping its Overweight rating. In a note sent to clients, Piper Jaffray writes, "Based on initial checks with storage focused resellers, we believe demand for storage equipment has remained robust in the December quarter and anticipate EMC will likely report Q4 results comfortably above consensus. The underlying drivers that helped accelerate demand in 2010 (cloud computing, data center consolidation and data growth) should continue throughout 2011 and we believe EMC will continue to capitalize on these trends. We also believe EMC's current product line has never been stronger with key acquisitions (VMware, Data Domain and Isilon) complementing several important new product releases (VMAX and mid-range refresh). We are reiterating our Overweight rating on EMC shares and raising our price target to $26." Shares of EMC lost 7 cents yesterday to close at $22.93, a loss of 0.3%. Breaking news

• Compugen Ltd. CGEN announced today that it has entered into an agreement with Baize Investments Ltd. under which it will receive $5,000,000 in R&D funding. To read the full news, click here.
• TPC Group Inc. TPCG today announced the final results of its modified "Dutch auction" tender offer, which expired at 5:00 p.m., New York City time, on December 23, 2010. To read the full news, click here.
• Puda Coal, Inc. PUDA today announced that on December 23 and 24, 2010, Shanxi Puda Coal Group Co. Ltd, a 90% subsidiary of Puda Coal, completed acquisition of coal mining rights and assets of four coal mines under Phase II of the Pinglu Project: Pinglu County Sanmenzhen Xuhutuo Coal, Pinglu County Daqi Coal, Shanxi Pinglu Renling Coal and Pinglu County Donggou Coal. To read the full news, click here.
• VisionChina Media Inc. VISN and Focus Media Holding Limited FMCN today announced they have entered into a securities purchase agreement. To read the full news, click here.

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