>> susie: from portugal to greece to ireland, the eurozone's debt woes are escalating and traders say u.s. investors should pay attention. >> it is one of a number of serious problems that continue to face the world economic system, but it's like everything else in our lives-- it kind of ebbs and flows. >> tom: 18 months after first becoming an issue, europe's financial troubles deepen. what the troubles mean for american markets. you're watching "nightly business report" for monday, may 16. this is "nightly business report" with susie gharib and tom hudson. "nightly business report"

is made possible by: this program is made possible by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. captioning sponsored by wpbt >> susie: good evening everyone. the head of the international monetary fund is in a u.s. jail tonight. dominque strauss-kahn was arraigned in new york today on charges of sexual assault and attempted rape. tom, these allegations add uncertainty to the debt crisis in europe. >> tom: susie, strauss-kahn is widely respected as an authority on europe's economic issues. his legal trouble comes at a critical time, as greece and other troubled countries are negotiating this week for financial help.

>> susie: today eurozone nations approved a big bailout package for portugal-- $111 billion. what do all these developments mean for american investors? suzanne pratt reports. >> reporter: i.m.f. director dominique strauss-kahn was supposed to be in brussels today tackling europe's newest money troubles. instead he sits in a manhattan jail, not far from the new york stock exchange. as if the eurozone didn't have enough problems, the arrest of strauss-kahn is the latest dark cloud for the region. veteran big board broker ted weisberg says it's also a stark reminder that u.s. investors should keep a watchful eye on europe. >> the world grows smaller economically every day, and i think what happens in europe does have an impact on the u.s. market. is it enough of an impact to completely derail the current positive bias that we've seen in the last 12 to 18 months? i'm not sure.

>> reporter: it's been nearly 18 months since europe's debt problems began to heat up with questions about greek solvency. in that time period, the dow is up more than 2,000 points, or a very healthy 20%. nevertheless, u.s. market experts are most concerned about a potential domino effect in europe. strategist scott wren is watching for a restructuring in greece followed by similar action in other beleaguered economies. >> certainly, i think you could get 5% or 10% pullbacks in the market on new news, whether it's portugal restructuring; whether it's something like ireland restructuring; and certainly if you see anything about spain having trouble-- any credit- spread widening there. many market pros rank eurozone sovereign debt problems at the top of their worry list, along with tension in the middle east and what that could mean for oil prices. but they also say stocks are still vulnerable to any weakness in the u.s. economy. >> a housing recovery is

probably pretty far off. we're looking for some sort of stabilization in terms of volumes and pricing, maybe at the end of this year, maybe in early 2012. i think this pricing issue in housing is something that's going to weigh on consumer confidence, and that's really never good for spending or the stock market. >> reporter: with so many potential speed bumps for investors in the coming months, experts say hold on for what could be a rough ride. suzanne pratt, "nightly business report," new york. >> tom: here are the stories in tonight's n.b.r. newswheel: stocks started the week on the downside, the dow fell 47 points, the nasdaq lost 46 and the s&p 500 was off eight. trading volume starts the week with 905 million shares moving on the big board and two billion on the nasdaq. speaking of the nasdaq, the nasdaq o-m-x group and the intercontinental exchange have dropped their $11 billion bid

for the n.y.s.e. euronext. the offer was nixed after u.s. antitrust regulators threatened to block it. in a move to keep the u.s. government from defaulting, treasury secretary timothy geithner today temporarily suspended investments in two big government pension plans. the move lets uncle sam keep borrowing by pushing off a potential default until august. separately, the u.s. treasury says china remains the biggest foreign holder of u.s. debt despite five straight months of cutting its stake. as of march, china held just over $1.1 trillion in u.s. treasuries. >> susie: still ahead, the n.f.l. and its players union are talking again, but billions of dollars of business are still at risk as the countdown to the season kickoff continues. >> tom: crude oil and retail gasoline prices fell as an emergency mississippi river spillway continues pouring flood water into louisiana's cajun country. the hope is to protect bigger towns and oil refineries down river. tom bearden with "p.b.s. newshour" joins us by phone from

baton rouge, louisiana. tom, what's the latest from your location? >> well, the crest is predicted to reach the morganza spillway sometime tomorrow and then continue downriver until it reaches baton rouge on wednesday. that probably gets more attention than it probably should. all it means is that the river will reach its highest level at that point. but it will stay there for several days, perhaps more than a week. and the water itself will retain in the area in the areas where it is backed up perhaps for a month or six weeks. >> tom: now the spillway was opened about 48 hours ago. and you have been traveling around the basin there. what has been the affect of this. >> it is a slow-moving flood. you're not talking about a wall of water five feet tall inundating towns and ranches and farms in one fell swoop. but rather seeping in to drainage canals and things of that nature and slowly rising. >> tom: tom, let's talk about the energy situation, because a decent amount of the u.s. gasoline supply comes from where you are at, the mississippi river area in louisiana.

almost 13% is brewed in nine refineries lining the river from baton rouge south to new orleans. are these refineries out of harm away. >> the department of energy seems to think so although some local officials are not quite so sanguine about that idea. the pore ganza spillway if it had not been open would have flooded two refineries in baton rouge as it is. there is one flood, or one refinery that's directly in the floodway and is considerably threatened by this. that is the one that is owned by the allen refining company in pratt springs, louisiana. >> tom: stay safe, and our best wishes for you and your crew and the folks you are talking to as well in louisiana. >> thanks very much. tom bearden with the pbs newshour with us from baton rouge, louisiana. >> thesearch giant was the $3 billion. google's move is similar to ones paid by other largetech companies including ebay and microsoft.

the company shares have slipped 9% this year so it is likely to use the proceeds to expand. now one option is buying other companies. under the aggressive new leadership of chief executive larry page who replaced eric schmidt back in april. >> tom: another step back for former harvard classmates mark zuckerberg. a federal appeals court today refused to rehear his decision against the brothers who sued zuckerberg saying the idea for facebook was there and zuckerberg stole it a settlement was reached back if 2008 but the brothers want more money. a federal court and an appellate court rather have already rejected that claim. the only avenue for appeal now is the u.s. supreme court can.

>> susie: tom, as you reported a short while ago the stock markets were down today. and if you look at the three major stock indexes, they are down about 2% for the month of may. so maybe that wall street saying, sell in may and go away, might be a good idea. >> tom: well, certainly so far this month it has held true. no doubt about it, susie. as we get off to a week start this week. let's go ahead and roll with tonight's market focus. >> tom: stocks had a negative bias throughout the day, thanks to the european debt news and weak manufacturing and housing confidence data.

the tech sector was the weakest. this is the past 180 sessions of the s&p technology sector exchange-traded fund. a nice rally from the labor day low, but today's drop of 1.4% came on twice its usual volume and pushes the fund down to its lowest price since staging this bounce in mid-april. apple shares fell more than 2%. after the close, we learned hedge fund manager george soros recently cut his stake in apple. by 24% to 230,000 shares. microsoft's 1.8% drop and cisco's 1.7% fall made them the two biggest declines inside the dow jones industrial average today. online job firm monster worldwide was the weakest in the broader tech sector, falling more than 8%. look at this drop here. this takes shares down to an

area of technical support, just below $15 per share. analysts think the selling could be in reaction to the planned initial public offering thursday of online networking site linked-in. why is that? because linked-in has been growing its job recruitment business, raising questions about new competition for monster worldwide. one other technology note-- blackberry maker research in motion. shares continue hitting multi- year lows, off a fraction today, but volume quadrupled. over the weekend, the company recalled about 1,000 of its new playbook tablet computers. they were shipped with bad operating systems, but most had not been sold to consumers. retail earnings out this week began with home improvement chain lowes. it was a disappointing report. earnings were two cents per share shy of estimates. sales fell from a year ago. volume tripled as shares fell more than 3.5%.

that takes the stock back to prices last seen in february. department store j.c. penney saw a better-than-expected start to the year. management credits using exclusive merchandise to attract buyers. the stock couldn't attract buyers though. shares fell more than 3%. choppy couple weeks for j-c-p. volume jumped five-fold. despite the drop today, the stock is up 35% compared to a year ago. tomorrow, home depot and walmart release their quarterly results before the opening bell. those shares were split today. after the close tonight, urban outfitters shares rallied 1.5% from this closing number, even though its results were slightly disappointing. now, we saw some volatility among exchange stocks, thanks to the nasdaq and intercontinental exchange dropping their buyout effort for the new york stock exchange. n.y.s.e. stock fell more 12.6%, but its now-former suitor, the intercontinental exchange, rallied more than 3%, and there are renewed rumors it may be

interested in the c.b.o.e.-- the chicago board options exchange. its shares jumped more than 2.5%. monday merger news-- flash memory maker sandisk popped 3%. nice move here, up to areas it's had trouble getting over past few weeks. it will spend $327 million for a privately owned flash memory company. and heavy equipment maker joy global added 1%, agreeing to spend $1.1 billion for mining equipment division of rowan companies. rowan closed down a fraction. and that's tonight's "market focus."

>> tom: for the first time in a month, the n.f.l. and its players union resumed talking about their stalled labor deal. tonight's "beyond the scoreboard" begins with the rising economic stakes as the stalemate continues. rick horrow is a sports business analyst and c.e.o. of horrow sports ventures. it's always nice to see you. so they are finally talking again. the nfl see did shall did season scheduled to kick off in four short months. so at what point do the economics have to play such a role that they either have to call thins on or call it off? >> secretary week in august. i made that up exact date but the bottom line is this court ordered mediation, nobody required to talk actually gets anything done. so then june 3rd is a hearing on the efficacy of the lockout long-term, assuming that happens, and another judge's ruling of how much the play i players get in any of the television. there is a maelstrom, considerable, and is so much at stake and the fans are

clamouring but now it is all academic. >> tom: $9 billion becomes real awfully quick, maybe sometime in august. so clearly here the fans have not turned off. but what is the risk for those nfl fans and the sponsors that try to attract those eyeballs? >> the internal studies the nfl has done have all said that the fans are to the going to go away and if they do they get it back very quickly. hopefully that's not turning into complacency as they negotiate. hockey took awhile. a lot of baseball fans are still staying away, same with the basketball issue which we'll ask foreday. but so the nfl really believes they have a gold mine an. >> tom: the nba you a lawyered to labor issues whiches had has put off until after the postseason and looks like a heck of a postseason as we are still seven games away from the championship. but the nba has continued to attract a greater television audience both on cable and on broadcast television with time warner and with disney. take a look at these numbers, rick. we've got 6 million viewers per game for tnt and time warner. and bracketing that are

disney's espn and abc. which one is doing better business with basketball. >> i would firmly answer that both do. and the reason i say that is because it is such a prolific postseason that the nba east with derek rose against everybody that is loved to be hated, the lebron james, dwayne wade duo in miami. but the west is very interesting. dallas and oklahoma city are two and a half hours from each other, night and day. they really kind of hate each other, a friendly rivalry. i was involved in the oklahoma city process. a vote in 1993, didn't think they would get a team. got a team. a billion dollars of economic revival, they are a great story lines all over the nba. >> tom: what is what makes for great business when it comes to this time year. but with the success of these games on cable with tnt and espn are the days of free over-the-air play-off basketball numbers. >> i will till. when the nba decided to go to cable for something as sacrosanct as their all-star game they said oh my god, armageddon, the world is falling it is not, we are still playing basketball. my sense is there will be room for the nba

championship games on network television. but it's to the going to dominate the mansion. >> tom: speak of basketball, the nc 2 a, aka march madness finally owns and has all the rights trade mark for that name, march madness. is it leaving money on the table by not taking van of this though? >> they haven't taken advantage of it before they could amalgamate the rights and now they do. the cbs turner deal gives them 14 years to expand their brand. billions and billions of dollars. they will change the logo around very shortly. they will have one logo. they will have other logos, home and away jerseys. they will absolutely fake advantage of the logo. >> tom: we will take advantage of our time with you as well, in the future, rick horrow with us, horrow sports ventures. >> susie: here's what we're watching for tomorrow: quarterly results from dell, as well as retailers home depot, saks, t.j.x.-- the parent company of marshall's and t.j. maxx-- and walmart. we'll also see the april reports on housing starts and industrial pduction. and our word on the street is "security."

in the wake of recent cyber- attacks, we'll profile three tech security stocks. u.s. homebuilders still have a pretty grim outlook for their industry. and the main reasons for their pessimism? a flood of foreclosures on the market, tight credit and high gasoline prices. the national association of home builders says its sentiment index is still at 16 this month. that's unchanged from april. readings below 50 indicate a negative opinion about the market. the index has not been above that level in five years. >> tom: traveling by plane this summer? listen to this. don't expect to see many empty seats. the air transport association of america predicts a busy summer travel season. it forecasts about 34,000 more flyers per day than last year. the number of international passengers is expected to hit a record of more than 26 million thanks to demand from latin america and asia. the busier travel season comes despite higher fuel prices and higher airfares.

>> susie: as we mentioned earlier, uncle sam came close to reaching his $14 trillion debt limit today. but the treasury secretary pushed off some payments as the debate over the debt ceiling continues. tonight's commentator has some suggestions. he's glenn hubbard, dean of columbia university's graduate school of business.

>> the debate over whether to raise the federal debt ceiling misses the point. of course, the nation should pay its bills. the question is what we will do to bring down future budget deficits? since 2008, the nation's debt burden more than doubled as a share of g.d.p., with much more debt forecast in the coming decade. higher debt burdens will absorb private saving and crowd out productive investment that can raise growth and wages. changing course is not impossible. the period between our victory in world war ii and 1960 saw our national debt fall in half relative to g.d.p. we accomplished this reduction through economic growth and by limiting new government debt, and we can again. we must emphasize pro-growth tax policy, lower discretionary spending, and reduced future growth in social security and medicare spending for more affluent americans. we need to be sealing the debt burden, not arguing about the

debt ceiling. i'm glenn hubbard. >> tom: just a reminder, you find us online at n.b.r. on pbs.org. there you can comment on our blog or watch any programs that you may have missed. or you can follow us on twitter, @bizrpt, or my personal feed, @hudsonnbr. if tweeting isn't your thing, friend us on facebook at bizrpt. >> susie: and finally, last month's royal wedding led to a within with the tsunami left nearly 30,000 people dead or missing. the casualties were overwhelmingly among the elderly, not just because they were more physically vulnerable. the crisis highlights the hazards of an aging population. and as japan grapples with the enormous cost of recovery, the country already has a head start in one area, an innovative job program for working seniors. lucy kraft reports. >> reporter: this is the face of retirement, japanese style. under a pioneering

government program, nearly one million able-bodied he woulde-- elderly citizens are urged to keep punching the clock as long as they can. so brigades of seniors spruce up public parks, sweep down sand boxes, and pack origami paper. the pay is minimum wage but it helps workers on figured incomes. and for many like this 73-year-old ex-steelworker, the real reward is an escape from loneliness, isolation and fear, especially in the wake of the earthquake and tsunami. >> this allows me to be with my peers, to have someone to talk to. >> reporter: surveys show a majority of japanese men and many women desire at least part-time work well into their golden years. >> it's heally to keep working. your body would go to seed if you had nothing to do every day. >> reporter: now 30 years old, the silver human resource centers have become a fixture in more than 1,000

communities across japan. offering job training and matching seniors with employers. experts say there's a strong cultural need to remain productive throughout life. >> to to get it-- in english, probably getting a sense of fulfillment. that is very important for people to live 20 or 30 years after retirement. >> reporter: while salaries are paid by employers, the silver centers are taxpayer subsidized. yet officials say the investment has paid for itself. >> what we've discovered is that by staying active longer seniors stay healthier so this holds down medical cost and the extra money seniors earn means they are less likely to need public assistance. >> but with more than 20% of jeez now 65 and older, the silver centers are overwhelmed by job sneakers

these days. crit kicks say the concept of silver centers-- has proved itself but now needs a radical overhaul. >> the kind of job k not really attractive, okay. and the reason is that the silver centers do not want to hurt commercial business in the area. and also they do not take away the work from younger people. >> reporter: by mid century one out of every two japanese will be 65 and older. to support this hypergray society, experts say jobs programs will have to be self-sustaining. the ideal program they say will offer a wide flexible menu of jobs from farming to food services to keep seniors active and involved in neighborhoods where they live. lucy kraft, nightly business report, tokyo. >> tom: updating a story we brought you a few minutes

ago, in the last several moments there has been a new wrinkle in the nfl. an appeals court granted a stay for the owners meaning players remain locked out for now pending yet another likely appeal. and that is nicely business report for this monday night, may 16th nangs for joining us. i'm tom hudson. have a great night. you too, susie. >> susie: same to you, tom. i'm susie gharib. thanks for watching, everyone. have a great evening. we hope to see all of you again tomorrow night. "nightly business report" is made possible by: this program was made possible by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. captioning sponsored by wpbt

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