Tag - Sda

Small caps have plunged late afternoon after the bailout bill failed to pass in the House overshadowing the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.’s brokered deal for Citigroup (NYSE:C) to purchase Wachovia’s (NYSE:WB) banking operations.

At 2:07 p.m. ET the Russell 2000 (NYSE:IWM) was down 5%, or 36, to 668. 

The House of Representatives failed to pass the $700 bailout bill, shocking markets and sending the S&P to its lowest level since 1997. After the bill failed, a motion was made for reconsideration of the bill; however attempts to revive it failed. Uncertainty looms around what comes next.

"Right now the market is extremely disappointed,” Andy Busch, global foreign exchange strategist of BMO Capital Markets, said. “It’s a huge embarrassment to both the Democratic and Republican leadership in the U.S. House. This bill shouldn’t have been brought to the floor if they couldn’t have passed it in its current form. I firmly believe that this was the gun to everyone’s head that they needed to see what was out there for the people who voted against it. I believe they will bring back this bill in another form and vote on it again. It’s dead for now…but I think it’s pretty clear they want to get something done because of the disastrous affect it’s had.”

In an attempt to battle the burgeoning credit crisis globally, the Federal Reserve along with the central banks of other countries said they will work together to inject cash into the global financial system to provide relief for debilitated banks. The U.S. central bank has also received authority to pay interest on reserves held by the Fed.

“This should encourage banks to leave funds at the bank while they receive 2%,” Busch said in an email. “This will allow the Fed to expand its balance sheet without forcing Fed Funds to zero. This means they can potentially pump up the liquidity by massive amounts to assist with the credit crunch.”

In the latest chapter of the credit crisis, Citigroup will act as Wachovia’s white knight under the direction of the FDIC and acquire its banking operations. Under the terms of the deal, Citigroup will assume $42 billion in losses and provide the FDIC with $12 billion in preferred stock and warrants, while the FDIC will absorb the remaining losses. The deal also contains a provision that protects Wachovia debtholders. To finance the deal, Citigroup said it will offer $10 billion in stock and cut its quarterly dividend by half to $0.16 per share. The sale follows the Charlotte, N.C.-based bank’s . . .

Brazilian food exporter Sadia S.A. (NYSE:SDA) hit a new 52-week low this morning after an analyst downgraded its stock.

Early this morning, CitiGroup downgraded Sadia to “sell” from “buy.”

Last week, the company said it lost more than $400 million on currency markets.

By late morning, the stock is at $8.66, down $0.84 from Friday’s close, after having fallen as low as $8.34. The stock had previously ranged between $9.02 and $26.27 during the past year. It took a huge hit on Friday, when it closed at $9.50, down sharply from a close of $15.27 on Sept. 25.

For detailed price information and news stories on Sadia, click SDA.

Small-cap stocks edged lower Friday, pulled down by the logjam in Washington as lawmakers were at loggerheads longer than expected putting together a rescue plan for the embattled financial arena. Still, a rally in the final hour of trading pared losses for small caps, and lifted the Dow into a solid gain. The Russell 2000 (NYSE:IWM) closed down 0.94, or 0.13% at 704.80 and is now down 7.9% for the year. Meanwhile, the Dow was up 1.10% Friday and is now off 15.9% for 2008; the S&P 500 was up 0.34% Friday and had slipped 17.3% so far this year.

The largest bank failure in history became official overnight as Washington Mutual Inc. (NYSE:WM) was seized by regulators and sold for $1.9 billion to JP Morgan Chase & Co. (NYSE:JPM). JPM shares rallied nicely on the news, gaining some 10% on the day. Normally, one would expect the largest bank failure in history to dominate the news landscape, but WaMu’s failure wasn’t all that much of a surprise, and stock in the company was already trading well below $2 coming into the session.

As for Washington’s $700-billion-dollar bailout of Wall Street, the “Paulson Plan” ran into more resistance than expected, especially from the Republican party. Although uncertainty about the final plan kept investors on edge, there seems little doubt that something will still be worked out fairly quickly — probably over the weekend.

The story within stocks for much of the day centered on the tech arena, with tech stocks taking a beating until the final hour of the session. Even the late rally still found the tech-laden Nasdaq 100 slipping 0.92% for the day. Within the tech front, key stocks like Research in Motion Ltd. (Nasdaq:RIMM) were taking a pounding; RIMM shares were off some 27% as the makers of the Blackberry warned that profits would miss the forecast. Also within techs, Apple Inc. (Nasdaq:AAPL) was off about 2.8%. There has been a hope building that passage of a financial rescue plan . . .