The most troubling aspect of the business is that they don’t own the intellectual property of many of the brands they made their name on and have lost some of the licensing contracts that once generated so much business for them.    Read More

Shoppers, enticed by heavy discounts and armed with rebate checks, spent freely in June...   Read More

Two pieces of positive news this morning: 1) Wal-Mart sales better than expected and raising guidance, and 2) Dow Chemicalspacer buying Rohm and Haas. Jobless claims lower than expected is also a help.   Read More

Traders are hoping for a quiet end to the week, ahead of Monday's Memorial Day holiday.
They say, though, a lot will depend on what happens with April's existing home sales data, released at 10 a.m., and the price of oil.    Read More

The original bid for Alitalia by Air France-KLM was based on an oil price of $86 a barrel, according to the Deputy CEO of Air France, in an interview on CNBC Europe. Those talks were shelved a month ago, but at $120 to $130, the Deputy CEO said that Air France-KLM would have to come up with a more "difficult and demanding" business plan.    Read More

Stocks may try to shake off losses Thursday, but spiking oil prices and a weak dollar could hold back efforts to rally.    Read More

As expected, the ECB and the Bank of England left interest rates unchanged; the ECB at 4.0 percent. Futures dipped a bit at 8:50 am ET as Mr. Trichet began talking, giving his usual speech on the importance of combating inflation.    Read More

Following are the week’s biggest winners and losers. Find out why shares of Halliburton and Bank of New York Mellon popped while American Airlines and The Gap dropped.   Read More

March retail same store sales were weak, outside of discounters. Remember companies and analysts have been aggressively taking down first quarter estimates for over a month (as well as same store sales), but companies like JC Penney, Target, Gap, Abercrombie, and Kohls were all notably below expectations on same store sales.    Read More

The debate about whether stocks are bottoming has been raging since last Tuesday and we've heard all points of view. But comments from market guru Bob Doll today got our attention. "No one rings the bell at the bottom, but I think I hear a bell ringing," Doll said on "Squawk Box."    Read More