Good morning. Here's what you need to know.
- Asian markets were higher in overnight trading with the Nikkei up 1.04%. Europe is higher after two solid bond auctions, and U.S. futures point to a moderately higher open.
- Spain sold €6.6 billion of government bonds maturing in 2016, 2019 and 2022, beating its €4.5 billion target. Yields on 10-year Spanish bonds rose after the auction. Meanwhile, France also saw strong demand for its debt, with the national debt management agency selling €7.97 billion of medium-term bonds at the higher end of its range.
- Rumors of Eastman Kodak's bankruptcy have been doing the rounds for a while, and now it's official. After meeting with Citigroup to obtain $950 million in emergency financing earlier this month, the 130-year old photography equipment pioneer has filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy.
- Greece's government and private creditors are meeting for a second day of debt-swap talks. Several hedge fund managers that hold Greek debt have said that they haven't been involved in talks on private sector involvement which center on a 50% haircut on their holdings. Prime Minister Lucas Papademos' government needs to reach an agreement with bondholders by March 20, when Greece will have to make a €14.5 billion repayment.
- In earnings news, Bank
of America posted Q4 earnings of $0.15 per share, on revenue of $25.1
billion, meanwhile, Morgan Stanley reported a smaller than expected Q4 net
loss of $0.15 per share, on revenue on $5.7 billion per share. Both
stocks are rallying nicely in the pre-market.
- Tech giants Microsoft and Google are also expected to post earnings of $0.77 per share, and $10.48 per share respectively.
- CPI and housing starts data for December will be released at 8:30 AM ET. Expectations are for 0.1% rise in core CPI, and a drop in housing starts to an annualized 678,000 units.
- After S&P's massive downgrade of European countries last week, Fitch has warned that its review of six European countries could result in one or two notch downgrades for most of them. In December, Fitch placed Belgium, Italy, Spain, Cyprus, Slovenia and Ireland on creditwatch negative
- Initial jobless claims data will be released at 8:30 AM ET, and the Philadelphia Fed Survey for January will be released at 10 AM ET. Consensus is for a drop in new claims to 383,000, and a drop in the general business conditions index to 10.
- Australia shed 29,300 jobs in December, losing jobs for a second straight month. The number of full-time jobs grew by 24,500 in December, and part-time employment fell by 53,700. The unemployment rate held steady at 5.2%.
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