Nasdaq at 5,120. S p 5002,087 and the russell down almost a full percent. But we begin now with the big deal in health insurance. It is official. An them agreeing to buy cigna for 188 per share in cash and stock. An enterprised are value of 54 billion. Straight to bertha coombs. Combined anthem and sigma would unseat United Health to become the largest u. S. Health insurer with 150 billion in annual revenues. More than 50 million members covering nearly 1 in 5 americans. Anthems ceo joseph swedish aide mitts put admits putting the two big firms together will be challenging but with that scale they can generate operating savings and make them more affordable. It will improper our ability to serve customers across commercial medicaid medicare and International Markets and create greater efficiencies and afford ability for our customers. But the anthem deal taken with aetnas proposed merger with humana would result in the big five insurers becoming the big three. One antitrust lawyer tell
The s p up by 3 and nasdaq up by 15 this comes after all the markets looks looked very strong yesterday. The dow was up by 260 points s p was up by 26 it was a record close for the s p 500 and thats its first since august 7th the dow closed at a onemonth high take a look at whats been happening in europe this morning. The gains we saw yesterday as concerns about irma faded a bit and, again, some concerns about north korea not quite as potent as they had been as we headed into the weekend this morning, it looks like a bit of a mixed picture in europe most of the major bourses are higher with the dax up by. 5 and a similar gain in france the ftse is down by about. 2 . Lets flip the charts and see what happens overnight in asia youll see when it comes to asia, there were some closes actually, lets go excavate to the currency check it looks like the dollar is down a little bit against the euro today. Below 120 for the first time if in several days. 1. 196. Dollar is up against the yen, 109
Percentage point dax is slightly weaker, relatively flat as is the cac. Crude oil prices, crude Oil Yesterday was flat ended up by two cents this morning another 44 cents 55. 35 so wti above 50 a barrel. Back to the markets in a moment first the latest developments on Hurricane Maria. The hurricane making landfall on the island of dominica as a category 5 storm it is now weakened slightly within the past few hours to a category 4 thats the good news forecasters warn that maria could reach strength as it nears the Virgin Islands, puerto rico also in marias cross hairs. You know, when these hurricanes come, they come. This come in waves we are also following developing stories out of Southern California overnight a magnitude 3. 6 earthquake shook parts of los angeles it happened at 11 20 p. M. Local time dren residents as far away as costa mesa felt the rumble joseph, why never heard of costa mesa i called it so ed ied it cos, im mesa. Im a messa in the morning. Look at my script its thi
Day. Cnbc, Institutional Investor hosting the sixth annual delivering alpha conference in new york city, bringing Hedge Fund Titans and investors together, offering their views on policy, the economy, politics and investing. In just a few moments well hear from elliott managements paul singer. Thats a big one. First, bridge Water Associates making news a moment ago, talking about rates along with former secretary tim geitner. Take a listen. When jamie dimon says to raise Interest Rates you think thats wrong . Thats right. I think thats wrong. At this stage, the risks are so asymmetr asymmetric. Theres no doubt you can slow the economy, world economy, u. S. Economy. Look at the inflation pressures, its a horrible thing. You look at the demographics. All of those things means that the risks are so much more on the downside. With all of that seemingly appropriate, we do have a selloff today, dow down 212, pretty much session lows. S p is down almost 30 points with horrible bredth all morn
Red across the board on some weak u. K. Cpi. Respectively sitting at or around new highs, the nikkei logging its best gain in two months. Apple puts ice new ipad retina on the market. And walmart steps up the competition. Another record close for the dow. The s p finishing just a fraction high of the alltime high. The nikkei closes at a high. And up say, jim, the dips are bought again and again and they are. A lot of times its just the intra day dip. Something might happen, a piece of data comes out and people say this is my chance. Theres a classic downgrade today of fedex. Fedex has been on fire. That deal with amazon and the post office, that is bad for fedex. Watch that stock. That will be the tell. It will go down a little and then buyers come in. Buyers cannot resist the transports. The downgrade of fedex to a market perform, they raise their price target from 136 to 117. They dont even mention the amazon ups deal. They say the value is outpacing demand i say thats convincing, i