Market Morning: A Flat Start
NEW YORK (
) -- Stocks on Wall Street look set to open flat Thursday, while European shares were mixed after mining giant
Xstrata
confirmed it's in merger talks with commodities trader
Glencore
.
Asian stocks climbed. Tokyo's Nikkei 225 rose 0.8% to close at 8,876.82, and Hong Kong's Hang Seng jumped 2%.
In the U.S. on Wednesday, stocks finished higher after strong manufacturing reports from the U.S., Europe and Asia boosted optimism.
The
Dow Jones Industrial Average
rose 83.3 points, or 0.7%, to 12,716. The
S&P 500
climbed 11.7 points, or 0.9%, to 1,324. The
Nasdaq
rose 34.4 points, or 1.2%, to settle at 2,848.
The economic calendar in the U.S. on Thursday features Challenger Gray's release on corporate layoffs at 7:30 a.m. EST, weekly initial and continuing jobless claims at 8:30 a.m., and the preliminary productivity index and unit labor costs data for the fourth quarter at 8:30 a.m.
on Wednesday with the social networking giant seeking to raise $5 billion in what would be the largest-ever tech IPO.
The 202-page S-1 filing reveals that
Morgan Stanley
(MS) - Get Report
will be the lead underwriter for the Facebook IPO, with
Goldman Sachs
,
Barclays Capital
,
Bank of America Merrill Lynch
,
J.P. Morgan
and
Allen & Co.
all involved.
Mining company
Xstrata
confirmed Thursday that it is in merger discussions with commodities trader
Glencore International
, a deal that would create an industry behemoth with around $175 billion worth of revenue.
Earnings reports are scheduled Thursday from
Merck
(MRK) - Get Report
,
Dow Chemical
(DOW) - Get Report
and
MasterCard
(MA) - Get Report
.
Royal Dutch Shell
(RDS.A)
, the European oil major, on Thursday posted a modest drop in fourth-quarter profit because of weaker refining operations.
Shell said net profit fell 4.3% to $6.5 billion.
Shell's production arm was helped by higher oil prices. But Europe's largest oil company said its refining arm swung to a loss.
Germany's
Deutsche Bank
(DB) - Get Report
said fourth-quarter profit fell 69% to €186 million ($245.06 million), hurt by the eurozone debt crisis.
The bank lost €351 million on a pretax basis.
Deutsche Bank said the debt crisis made investors shy away from riskier investments, leading to reduced revenue from investment banking.
-- Written by Joseph Woelfel
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Joseph Woelfel
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