news blog from Emilie

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Oct 20

UPDATE 1-Werner Enterprises Q3 rev misses market estimates


Oct 18 (Reuters) - Trucking and logistics company Werner Enterprises Inc’s third-quarter revenue missed market expectations, hurt by weaker freight demand.The company, which hauls truckload shipments mainly for retailers, and consumer and grocery products companies, said concerns about the economy in the United States weighed on freight demand in the quarter.July-September net income rose to $29.6 million, or 40 cents a share, from $24.2 million, or 33 cents a share, a year ago.Revenue rose 10 percent to $509.6 million.Analysts, on average, had expected earnings of 40 cents a share on revenue of $521.4 million, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.On Tuesday, smaller rival Marten Transport Ltd reported weaker-than-expected third-quarter results.Shares of the Omaha, Nebraska-based company, closed at $23.35 on Tuesday on Nasdaq.

Posted 7 months ago

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Oct 14

Chinese mills offered better Q4 iron ore pricing options-sources


“We received a letter from Vale asking us for our opinion of changing fourth-quarter pricing to be based on October-December spot rates,” said a source with one of China’s mid-sized steel mills.The spokeswoman at Vale was not immediately available for comment.Reuters reported on Thursday that Chinese mills were seeking to postpone shipments or renegotiate fourth-quarter iron ore contracts.Currently, prices for quarterly contracts are generally based on the average index prices over a three-month period ending a month before the start of each quarter.That means that prices for the fourth quarter would normally have been based on average spot prices from June to August, when prices were higher than now.Platts 62-percent grade index prices IODBZ00-PLT from June to August stood at an average $175.63 a tonne, cost and freight, down marginally from $176.96 in March-May, the basis for third-quarter pricing.Platts’ index, which tracks Chinese import prices, has shed more than $20 a tonne, or 13 percent, since early September to its lowest since November last year, ending Thursday at $160 per tonne. Other key indices have also slumped.

Posted 7 months ago

82 notes

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Oct 13

Hulu sale called off after months of talks


“Our focus now rests solely on ensuring that our efforts as owners contribute in a meaningful way to the exciting future that lies ahead for Hulu,” they said in a statement.Reuters reported last month that the auction was in danger of getting derailed by conflicts over convoluted digital rights, a wide bid-ask gap, and a lack of commitment to sell by Hulu’s owners, among other things.This was the second time Hulu’s owners had envisioned a full or partial exit strategy that failed. After nearly six months of planning, they ditched an initial public offering last December that might have raised up to $300 million.Sources with knowledge of the talks said last month a rift had developed between the price bidders offered and the amount that Hulu’s owners were willing to accept.Bids had ranged from as low as $500 million to as much as $2 billion, the sources said at the time. The most serious suitors included Google Inc, Amazon.com Inc, DirecTV and DISH Network Corp.Yahoo Inc had been viewed as one of the most enthusiastic bidders — before its leadership imploded with the abrupt firing of CEO Carol Bartz.Hulu’s owners had always faced an uphill battle in valuing a nascent Web content-streaming service with no long-term content deals and with unclear digital rights for newer Internet or mobile platforms for which there exists no established model.Some analysts had thought an outright sale to be an abandonment of Hulu’s future growth potential, particularly if, as some experts say, Internet streaming will become mainstream in coming years.

Posted 7 months ago

63 notes

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Oct 13

Singapore Hot Stocks-Chinese property firms surge


Perennial China Retail Trust , which owns shopping malls, rose 12.4 percent to S$0.255, while CapitaMalls Asia rose as much as 2.4 percent.”Chinese property counters listed in Singapore have been massively oversold, so the rebound in their Chinese counterparts is helping to spark a similar rally here,” said a local trader.Several Chinese property developers, such as Evergrande Real Estate Group Ltd and Poly (Hong Kong) Investment Ltd , said this week they recorded strong increases in contracted sales in the first three quarters despite Beijing’s tight credit policy to slow the country’s rampant property market.Hong Kong authorities also announced milder-than-expected steps to ease public discontent about sky-high property prices.Hong Kong Chief Executive Donald Tsang said the government would resume the construction and sale of subsidised housing.

Posted 7 months ago

153 notes

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