that two top greek officials will not attend that key meeting for health reasons. the dow tumbled almost 140 points, the nasdaq lost 56 and the s&p 500 fell 21 points. suzanne pratt takes a look at what's troubling investors. >> reporter: talking with traders here at the new york stock exchange today about what's bugging investors, you guessed it. it starts with an "e" and ends with an "e": europe. specifically, spain's official request for a bailout was a downer, suggesting to some there will soon be a third european country that needs help. on top of that, there's little confidence the e.u. two-day summit, beginning thursday, will produce any credible solutions. still, among traders, there's always the hope for a silver bullet. >> the consensus would be that if they could have one thing happen, it would be some sort of centralized, financial body that would come out of this meeting that would oversee all of them. >> reporter: others see that as an unlikely outcome, especially as german leaders continue to dig their heals in on sharing their neighbor's debt. >> the latest comments out of german chancellor angela merkel today signal continued lack of room of compromise between germany and some of the weaker peripheral countries. >> reporter: beginning in about two weeks, earnings season will be off and running on wall street. good or bad news from corporate america will at least provide investors with some distractionw york. >> tom: still ahead on "n.b.r.", we begin a week-long look at the foodie craze. tonight, how technology is changing what and how we eat. "nightly business report" is brought to you by: captioning sponsored by wpbt >> susie: more signs of a foundation forming in the housing market, tom, new home sales in may hit their highest level in over two years. susie, may sales jumped 7.6% to 369,000 units, while april's numbers were also revised higher. meanwhile, median new home prices rose over 5.5% from a year ago to almost $235,000. the inventory of new homes for sale also edged up, rising almost 1% to 145,000 units last month, still that remains near record lows. >> susie: our guest tonight says housing is doing better. he's robert brusca, chief economist of fact and opinion economics. bob, you say the trends are improving. what is it that you are keying in on? well, it's not one particular report. i am very happy to see the increase in new-home sales but even existing home sales have a good trend in place. they're moving up. we see house prices are improving. we see medium and average home prices for existing home goesing up, new home prices going up. these are the trends that you need in order to think that the recovery in housing is going to be real. people need to think they can buy a house. they can put their money down and the price isn't going to fall this is a very important development. >> but we just reported that still on the supply side the inventory of the number of new homes still on the high side. and also existing home sales were down in mayment does any of that concern you? >> no, it doesn't. because you know these home sale numbers are going to fluctuate month-to-month. you need to look at the trends. the trends are very clear, pressee powerful. you know, and this isn't a revival that is so strong that it looks like it's to the going to last. and that's the nice thing about this. is that you look back, this has been building momentum for some time. so the economy has challenges, risks it is not like we're out of the woods and everything is go stock great. this really looks like a true step in the right direction. >> a lot of people say that the only way we'll get a housing recovery is if there is a jobs recovery. and the job market has been kind of weak the last couple of months. can we have a housing recovery if businesses aren't going to be hiring that much? >> well, probably not a very good one. but businesses are hiring. we are getting some improvement. the unemployment rate is falling. and these things will feed on one another. housing is getting better, that fact certificate going to help stimulate the economy and the economy itself will help to get better. what i hope we can build upon here is a virtuous circle instead of the vicious circle of things getting worse. i think housing can reinforce a positive trend in the economy. >> susie: and you know, we have these superlow-interest rates. and a lot of people who are-- and prices coming down as you just mentioned and a lot of people without do want to get a home are still having a tough time getting a mortgage from the banks. you know what do you think can be done on that front to stimulate, you know, more buying? >> well, this is a complicated problem. when you look at home affordability we look at mortgage rates but a lot of people can't get those mortgage rates. so what i think actually is that we can come into a period where the economy will look better. interest rates will actually rise. and it will help banks be more willing to lend. it will actually help people to buy a house. even though higher rates make houses less affordable, if you can get the interest rates, it's better for you. so i really think one of the problems with the economy right now is that interest rates are too low. they're low but that is restricting the slablt of credit. as interest rates rise i think banks will become more interested. more willing to lend money to a broader scope of the population. >> we didn't get any sense from the federal rezfb last week that interest rates are going to be going up any time soon. so in that context and we are at the halfway point for the year what is your economic outlook for the rest of the year? you sound pretty upbeat but you know what is your outlook? >> well, i think the economy is going to build some momentum. i feel pretty good about the trends in the economy. i think that we had some exaggerated strength earlier. i think now we getting exaggerated weakness but i think we will pick up and get jobs back in that 140 to 150,000 range. and it might my big worry like everybody else is europe. europe is one catastrophe that will unravel the trend wes have going on. but i think the trends are back if place and the economy is growing. and i think it is modest but solid growth. >> that's very encouraging to hear. thank you sop much, bob. great having you here. robert brusca, chief economist of fact and opinion economics. >> tom: tropical storm debby weakened a little today in the gulf of mexico as it dumps rain on parts of north florida. even though the storm shuttered some oil production in the gulf, oil prices headed south on worries about europe dragging the global economy down. oil prices fell 55 cents to $79.21 a barrel in new york trading. 44% of the gulf's oil production was shut down for the storm, but already some oil and gas producers are restarting production, as debby moved closer to florida's panhandle. >> susie: everyone's was waiting this morning for a key ruling from the supreme court on the obama health care law, but the high court has put off that decision until thursday. the justices today did issue rulings on other items, including the legality of arizona's controversial immigration law. they upheld the heart of the law, which requires state police to check the immigration status of people they stop. but as darren gersh reports, the decision also blocked parts of the law that make it illegal for undocumented workers to look for jobs. >> reporter: supporters of arizona's tough anti-illegal immigration law claim the supreme court handed them an important victory today. the court upheld a controversial arizona law requiring police to check immigration status, if they have reason to suspect someone is in the country illegally. but the court threw out most of the rest of the law, including a section that made it a state crime for undocumented workers to look for work. the court decision makes it clear states cannot adopt tougher immigration penalties that may undermine federal law. but critics say the mixed ruling is a bad one for employers who want a predictable workforce. >> as long as we have laws like this that create this level of uncertainty, i think it is bad for business. if you took the undocumented workers out of arizona, they lose billions of dollars in the local economy. >> reporter: states ranging from alabama to utah have passed tough legislation patterned on the arizona law. the supreme court's decision will now make it harder to convince other states to join the crack down. >> they make it harder for our side of the issue, the americans who want stronger law enforcement to get more of the obligation on employers to be part of the solution. >> reporter: employers in arizona are still subject to tough state sanctions on employers who hire workers without the proper documents. critics of arizona law say they need immigration reform that recognizes the reality of the labor market. >> unfortunately, these companies that need this ready pool of labor are in no better situation now than were before the supreme court's ruling. simply put, what we fear the most perhaps on the ground right now is labor shortages in several industries, because the system has not been repaired. >> reporter: and today, the supreme court made it clear the job of repairing the nation's immigration system rests with congress. darren gersh, "n.b.r.", washington. >> tom: the supreme court also dealt a blow to those looking to curb corporate spending on political campaigns. sylvia hall reports. >> reporter: in a five to four decision along ideological lines, the supreme court struck down a montana law that has limited corporate and union campaign contributions for 100 years. by refusing to hear arguments, the supreme court effectively upheld its controversial 2010 decision that corporations and unions have the same right to free speech that citizens do when it comes to political donations. a move that extends it to the state level. the decision two years ago was a game-changer for federal elections, opening the door for new groups called super pacs. they raise and spend huge amounts of money for or against political candidates. this election cycle more than 600 super pacs have raised over $240 million and spent more than $130 million in support of political candidates, including president obama and republican challenger mitt romney. the issue today was whether states could limit the same practices in their own elections. the justices delivered a huge blow to campaign finance reformers who hoped the court would allow such limits. sylvia hall, "n.b.r.", washington. >> tom: a little later in the program, we'll take a deeper look at today's campaign finance ruling with thestreet.com's joe deaux. >> susie: also today, the u.s. supreme court declined to review the payout plan for victims of ponzi schemer bernie madoff. investors wanted the high court to force madoff trustee irving pickard to change the method for calculating victims' losses. there plan would have increased payouts. instead, the high court upheld an appeals court decision approving the original calculation method. >> susie: anheuser busch inbev is close to taking control of grupo modelo in a deal valued at an estimated $15 billion. inbev already holds a 50% stake in modelo and if a deal goes through, the belgian brewer would own corona beer, one of the world's top beer brands, an official announcement could come this week. one sticking point: getting the okay from u.s. regulators. inbev already controls a big chunk of the u.s. beer market. >> susie: tom, modelo shares are traded on the mexican stock exchange. they jumped 10%, but then were halted for news. inbev shares here on the big board also rose about 1% to $70.85 a share. but it was a down day for most other stocks trading here at the nyse. >> tom: let's take a look at what's happening in tonight's market focus. stronger new home sales in the u.s. were not enough ahead of a summit this week of european leaders. stocks were weak right from the opening bell. the lowest point of the day came at noon eastern and finished down 1.6%. the selling last week and today has erased much of the index's june rebound. all ten of the major stock sectors were lower with technology down 2.2%. financials down 2.1%. and the energy sector falling 1.9%. trading volume was moderate 751 million on the big board. almost one and a half billion on the nasdaq. leading the sell off in technology was a pair of semiconductor stocks. communications chip maker broadcom fell 6.1% down to a three week low. advanced micro devices shed 5.6% to its lowest since the first week of january. we also had word of some deal making in technology. the first has microsoft spending over $1 billion for a business social networking company. it's a $1.2 billion deal for yammer and its more than five million corporate users. microsoft will fold it's services into microsoft's cloud computing business. microsoft has been building out its software on demand business even as it prepares to launch the latest windows operating system later this year. shares of microsoft fell 2.7%. it will dip into its almost $60 billion in cash for the deal. the deal is a possible buyout of quest software, which is the target of at least two offers. this latest values the stock at $27.50 per share from a strategic buyer. dow jones reports that bidder is thought to be dell. the offer trumps t];&rice earlier offered by private equity buyers. quest stock closed over the competing offer, indicating an even higher bid could be coming. quest makes business and security software. with the european anxieties feeding concerns about the u.s. economy again today, big banks were weighing on the market. morgan stanley, citigroup and bank of america each fell by more than 4%. analysts point out with global finance in the headlines thanks to the troubles at spanish banks, there's a lot of nervousness about how the second quarter will shape up for the multi-national banks. the quarter comes to end this week. trouble natural gas giant chesapeake energy came under more scrutiny today. reuters reported emails show chesapeake worked with one of its biggest competitors, encana, to keep down land prices as they bid for new energy sources. its just the latest negative cloud over chesapeake. shares fell 8.5% today. the company has been under pressure for dealings with c.e.o. aubrey mcclendon. the reuters investigation alleges chesapeake worked with a rival to split land before a public auction to avoid driving up prices. ecana's u.s. traded shares fell on the reports as well down more than 4%. all five of the most actively traded exchange traded funds were down with the stiffest selling in the financial sector fund down 2.1%. and that's tonight's market focus. >> tom: more now on the impact of one of today's supreme court rulings in the stock market. the high court effectively upheld it's controversial ruling allowing corporations to spend freely on political issues and candidates. that brings us to tonight's word on the street: contribution. joe deaux is a reporter at thestreet.com. joe, we mentioned earlier the amount of money that is likely to be raised and spent by corporations this election cycle. are they taking sides with these campaign contributions? >> the idea after citizens united went through is that they were going to take sides and they were going to have this massive-- but what investors are starting to realize is that board members don't like to align themselves off when one party or one candidate. and shareholders of those companies are also pretty diversified and their own ideologies on things. so what we're seeing is that maybe these companies, though they now can contribute a lot of their own money from their, from their actual corporation, they're really not taking side as much as people might think. it is really individuals who are giving a lot of money to super pacs. >> maybe not the corporations but the individuals. you mentioned shareholders, there have been a lot of shareholder efforts over the last few years to try to force companies to put campaign contributions up to a shareholder vote to be more transparent. have any of those been successful? >> it's a mixed bag. postly it seems like it's just a lot of activist shareholders just trying to bring attention to certain issues. back in february a group of investors at apple had tried to claim that there was a conflict of interest with one of their board members, a guy named al gore, former vice president. they said that their greenhouse gas regulations were actually benefitting al gore. of course you know, it didn't really pan out so well. but really what most of the investors want is more transparency. they want to know now that corporations can spend the money on campaigns they want to know where it's going and why they are spending it. >> joe, let's take a look at where a lot of this money winds up by is in broadcast media, television, especially. cbs being among those that receive those contributions that wind up as advertisements. what did analysts say was the impact on cbs's bottom line. >> what they are saying about cbs is if you are going to invest in them right now you may have missed the train already. the idea is usually investors get in on cbs or news corporate because they know that a lot of money is going to be spent on campaigns. they get in like october of the year prior to the actual election year. and then they pretty much sell off the stock by the first of there actual election year. the local affiliates make so much money they're expected about $3 billion to go into aad buys. and the reason the locals mat certificate so much is barack obama and mitt romney don't necessarily care some of about california. because they know what way that is going to swing. they care more about like ohio or florida and want to target those specific audience-- audiences. >> at the end of the day the stocks may have seen a bump with the spending that is still to come this fall. they have already reacted to it. do you have any positions in news corp. on cbs. >> i do not. >> word on the street with joe deaux, with the >> susie: technology is transforming how we decide what to eat. in an industry already known for tight profit margins, blogs, web sites, and apps dedicated to eating have made the business of food more competitive. tonight, erika miller kicks off our week long look at the foodie craze. reporting on how both new and old media are changing the way we eat. >> food is something that is to be shared. it is used in celebrations, in life, in love, in death, in rituals. in religious ceremonies. >> reporter: so, it's natural that many people are passionate about what they eat and where they eat it. thanks to technology, there have been big changes in how we share our meals. >> you go on the internet. you search yelp. or maybe you are walking outside and you say what's good to eat nearby. then you go to an open table. you make a reservation. you email your friends to tell them, "hey, meet me there." you get there, one friend is sort of checking in on foursquare. the other is sort of tweeting about your get-together. >> reporter: restaurants know this and are doing whatever they can to make social media work to their advantage. there are 580,000 restaurants in the u.s. a number that's been falling the past few years. the hardest hit have been independent, mom and pop restaurants. for them, especially, customer reviews on sites like yelp have a direct impact on the bottom line. >> positive reviews on yelp are positively correlated to restaurant sales. so i think it's helpful for restaurants to get user generated content and favorable review their restaurant on yelp. and on opentable as well. >> reporter: of course food magazines haven't gone away. many people still enjoy reading restaurant reviews in newspapers. but advertising revenues for food magazines fell over 16% last year on top of a 17% drop the prior year. both represent the biggest declines of any category. >> if i'm a publication, and i'm only going to print once a week or once a month, then the data on the reviews is a lot more stale then last night or today's review on a user generated content standpoint. >> reporter: one new trend in the foodie craze is ultra- personalization. there are now websites, blogs, and apps dedicated to everything from bacon to vegan friendly food trucks. erika miller, "n.b.r.", new york. >> susie: tomorrow on n.b.r. our look at the foodie craze continues with housewares. from cookware to dinnerware and the other tools of the trade. we learn what's cooking in this $300 billion industry. >> tom: this month hundreds of thousands of out-of-work americans have not received unemployment checks as extended unemployment benefits are phased out. tonight's commentator says slow job growth this spring is proof congress acted too fast in cutting back on those checks. here's rutgers university professor bill rodgers. >> last month's government report on job growth was a stark reminder of the nation's bifurcated recovery. 4.3 million private sector jobs have been added over the past 27 months, but this amounts to a monthly average of 158,000, not enough to provide opportunity for those that lost their job or can only find part-time employment. what does this mean? it means that congress dialing back in the duration of extended unemployment insurance benefits was premature. when the legislation was passed, 11 states had jobless rates that exceeded the national average. an additional 13 states had unemployment rates that were below the national average. common to these 24 states is the fact that all have experienced little to no private sector job growth, leading to longer searches, discouragement, and exit from the labor force. the policy response is straight forward. when the debate to cut benefits returns, employment growth must also be used to set policy. resources to assist the unemployed and underemployed should not only be targeted to high unemployment states, but also to states experiencing weak job growth. >> susie: and finally tonight, >> susie: that's "nightly business report" for monday, june 25. have a great evening, everyone, and you, too, tom! >> tom: good night, susie and everyone. we'll see you online at nbr.com and back here tomorrow night. 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