merrill lynch cut its rating of the stock to "underperform." merger talk is a regular staple of the markets these days, with new and old rumors. the old rumor making a comeback today involved the "new york times." the stock was the biggest percentage gainer of the s&p 500, rallying 8% on four times usual volume. just last week, shares hit a 52- week low. the rumor making the rounds again is mexican billionaire carlos slim may be looking to buy the company. he already owns 7% and has loaned it $250 million. others making moves today including zymo-genetics. we told you about this deal last night. bristol-myers squibb is buying the bio-pharmaceutical maker for $9.75 per share in cash, a huge premium from last night's closing price. this is a three month chart. the market may be looking for a higher offer with the stock closing at $9.76. computer software security firm symantec rallied more than 4% on twice its usual volume. it's been talked about as a potential merger candidate since intel's buyout of mcafee. the stock is at a one-month high. a c

this is about land rover and merrill lynch and jp morgan chase and citigroup.s is about. the companies still in business stand to make billions. not the rich guy that you work for, factory you see every day. i don't mean that guy. i mean george soros. i have my minion, al gore. we will make cook stoves for everybody. not everybody, but food for our cook stoves. they are push the carbon trade dollars getting richer on your dollars. yours. they are taking it through your tax dollars. we are buying cook stoves. the regular ceos are freaking out. most voted for the clowns but they're freaking out because they can't keep the doors open. they know we're in trouble. those are the regular ceos. not the george soros. they have been preparing this for a long time. they helped create. look at how al gore profited on the hysteria he created, increasing his personal wealth 50 to 100 times or more. i have no problem anybody wants to be a capitalist. i got no problem on that. but while you increase fortunes of the elite, they're galvanizing their power and setting up global g

compensation for emotional injury because of state parole agents did not find her watch was being held by merrill lynchaim was not covered-jaycee dugard she is not deserving of compensation when her daughter was being held. -kidnappers. and a cooler wet weekend and will have details coming up in just a bit. live from the bay area's news station this is kron 4 news at 4:30 >> that has been a week since the deadly fire in san bruno. to take our residents of the homes were allowed to go in and recover what is left. jeff bush tells us what was life for one man who lost almost everything. >> homeowners have been sifting to this burned

money of the market and invested into safe but low- yielding certificates of deposit a recent merrill lynchhowed more young people are conservative that's all other age groups when it comes to finances. of the new york stock exchange and police said taylor. >> hewlett-packard is suing former ceo mark heard from stopping him to take a job at a rival or cold. this comes one day after oracle hired her to call president helped lead the database software maker and muscling and more of h-p's turf. h-p claims that hurd would be able to perform the job at oracle without stirring hp's trade secrets and violating a confidentiality agreement. >> of the trees outside a big changeover yesterday much much cooler and in the '60s and '70s this afternoon about 20 to 25 degrees cooler than yesterday. will talk about this cool down- and how long it's going the last coming up a few minutes. the most powerful half-ton crew in america has a powertrain backed for 100,000 miles. chevy silverado half-ton a consumers digest best buy and the most dependable, longest-lasting full-size pickups on the road. now get 0% a

last week, bank of america merrill lynch cut its rating on visa. mastercard fell more than 2%. sanford bernstein is the latest firm to raise concern, cutting its rating on both stocks today to market perform. new swipe fees regulations is one worry analysts point to. visa and mastercard earn money by directing card information from a store to the issuer of the card. a new law requires stores have more than one network, instead of exclusive deals. hewlett-packard's buyout binge continues. its latest takeover is tech security firm arcsight. rumors started heating for up last month around arcsight. this h.p. deal gives shareholders $43.50 per share. with the stock closing above that price, the market thinks a higher price will be coming. between this deal, and the bidding war between h.p. and dell for cloud computing firm 3par, there's a new look at data services-- and that may explain moves we've seen lately in xerox. shares shot up to their highest price since early august. barron's reports xerox wants to grow its data services business similar to how h.p. has focused on technol

the only guys i work with closely on wall street are my two brothers at merrill-lynch and unbelievablee guys, i had pneumonia, they, not fox, sent me flowers. [laughter] >> i'm going to leave a note here on neil's desk so he knows you did not get those flowers that he sent to you. >> right. >> 'cause that was there when he put the order in. >> and wall street sent them to me. >> i didn't know you were sick, so-- that's my excuse. >> adam, listen, you're like, you're a capitalist, but maybe i would call you a social capitalist, in other words, you seem to always be on the side of the regular people and a lot of times these days that means anti-wall street. do you think that's the case still? >> well, i'm not an enemy of wall street. i mean, i make my living writing partly about, about wall street. i think on the one hand, tom is kidding himself that this movie doesn't set out to vilify wall street. that's exactly what oliver stone set out to do. dagen is right, certain people will see this and say, i want to wear a suit and have a shaved head like that guy. i want to be just like him. s

bought merrill lynch in january of last year. >> susie: when you picture fashion from the '80s, there's a good chance you think of esprit. the brand had big logos-- and big success-- especially with teenage girls. but in the '90s, esprit pulled out of the u.s. and focused on europe. now the retailer is back, with a new flagship store in new york city. in tonight's "shoptalk," erika miller looks at the new spirit of esprit. >> reporter: this man is no ordinary esprit customer. he's john gunn, the president of esprit for the americas, buying clothes for himself. yes, esprit, a brand popular with teenage girls in the '80s, now has a men's line. why did you extend the brand into menswear? >> the brand, when it came from europe, always had menswear. men are coming down, and they are absolutely shocked that we have such a sophisticated men's collection. >> reporter: that's not the only strategic shift. clothing styles have become more sophisticated, to broaden esprit's appeal to older shoppers. you won't find any current merchandise emblazoned with the iconic esprit logo, except a few throwba

a major development in battle from merrill lynch. a new poll shows martin o'malley with a big lead over bob urlich. but he now has 52% of the vote. the former governor is now disputing the poll. more on that every action from the voters coming up at 6:00. for more on the governor's race and other big races this november, mixer your water bottle grand 2010 s special tonight at 7:00 right here on abc 7. -- make sure you watch battleground 2010 special tonight at 7:00 right here on abc 7. >>> jimmy carter will not be making tonight's appearance at george washington university. a spokeswoman says he is in good spirits of mckeown forward to getting back to his schedule. >> a lot of people have complaints about cabs and now they have a place to speak those concerns. >> today we took a closer look at what really requires the most. whether it is discrimination or meter misuse, cabdrivers in d.c. have stories to share. t>> this man relies more on cabs now because of a medical problems. >> sometimes i think they want -- [inaudible] >> they are

that was merrill lynch. that left usith barclays, barclays had the problem with guarantee. >> thank you mr. chairman. >> before we go to mr. zubrow, i want to ask you one question, mr. zubrow, this is between jpmorgan and lehman over the period of 2007, 2008, and in particularly in those critical days. it's a chronology which i'll enter into the record. but i want to ask you specifically about one item. on the 14th, which is the critical sunday, mr. zubrow, apparently federal reserve staff person parkinson told our staff that you told him and other fed officials on the 14th that jpmorgan chase would not unwind transactions and provide until the fedex anded the types of collateral that could be financed by the pdcf. is that accurate? >> we were very concerned that there would not be investors that would be willing to lend money to lehman brothers on the 15th such as if we did the unwind for the broker dealer on the morning of the 15th. >> right. >> but added the collateral. >> and no one would be there at nig

a fe people profit a great deal in 2006, for example, merrill lynch estimate of the speculation was causing commodity prices to rise 50% higher rather than if they were just based on supply and demand alone. the consequence is the government's such as mozambique find themselves in a position on the price of wheat goes sky high, that they're caught between a rock and hard place they make the political decision to pass the costs onto the citizens. that proved to be a very poor decision. people in the city protested widely. 13 people were killed as a result of initial reports that rubber bullets were being fired a one report suggests the reason the police switched to live ammunition is because they ran out of rubber bullets there is nothing natural about those consequences. those are human conditions compound in the effect of the strange climatic events we are experiencing worldwide. >> raj patel, the food and cultural atagricultural organization says it is the third largest wheat crop ever. how is that possible and have a world record of hundred people- and have the largest number of hundred

wrote all these insurance contracts to banks, so banks like goldman sachs, and deutsche bank, and merrill lynch -- they had gotten a.i.g. to insure them against losses on their mortgage bonds, and sure enough, when the mortgage market went south, a.i.g. was paying out all these insurance claims to the banks, they couldn't afford it, and so the government stepped in and bailed out a.i.g. this is very controversial, because a lot of the money the government put into a.i.g. went right out the back door to the banks who had contracts with a.i.g., and that's part of the reason this has been one of the most controversial bailouts. >> suarez: robin, an indirect bank bailout to even more institutions we were aware of when it was happening? >> yeah. they got bailed out for the sins of wall street. you talk to old-school a.i.g. executives, and they say that they were a patsy, or that they were crucified for everybody else's sins, that it was a transitive backdoor bailout, and in reality that's what it was, and the thing that held the entire system hostage was not just that a.i.g. being allowed to fail wo

the bankruptcy of lehman brothers, and the acquisition of merrill lynch announced on monday september 16. and growing concerns about the viability of aig, which letter culminated in a transaction in which the federal reserve acquired most of aig's equity. on thursday, september 25, in an unusual item, the seizure of the largest savings bank in the united states was announced, washington mutual bank. the subsequent place of washington mutual under fdic s receivership for possibly $1.9 billion. on september 25, a tentative agreement in the u.s. congress regarding the economic establishes a proposal collapse. the combination of these events from earlier in september, the seizure of washington mutual on thursday, the 25th, and the collapse of the congressional agreement precipitated a sharp downward turn in the financial markets. the cost to ensure wachovia is dead as evident by credit default swap for s -- credit default spreads. on friday the 26 there was significant downward pressure on the common stock and deposit base, and as the day progressed, pressures intensified as financial ins

bank of america decided to merge with merrill lynch on saturday, september 13. so we could not get the merger done via the question then became, what is the best alternative plan? in our view and the view of our advisers, the best plan was to put the parent into the chapter 11 proceedings and keep the u.s. broker-dealer alive with bridge financing of the fed, not waiting for some other hypothetical merger partner to arrive, because we did not think that would ever happen, but alive long enough to conduct an orderly winddown until we could do the proceedings. that was the contingency plan. >> on page 9 of your testimony, and this is where i need you to explain, you say detect in this case, lehman had no ability to pledge the amount of collateral required to secure a fed guarantee -- one large enough to credibly withstand a run by lehman's creditors and counterparties. how short were they? >> let's imagine an unlimited guarantee of the trading obligations of lehman which was $600 billion in assets size. how much collateral would you need for a guarantee of that ki

we were worried about a collapse of lehman, goldman, merrill lynch, all white in a row and the consequences. >> you were able to assess those as very likely to occur? >> we were very worried that they would occur, we thought that the loan that we provided in connection with an acquisition of bear stearns would be repaid so the taxpayer would not actually take any losses. it was a tool that congress gave us to deal with these situations. we had a tool and we did not use it and there was a horrible effect and the federal reserve stood by. we decided to provide the credit. >> mr. steele, can you provide any further information about what was in your mind? ? well, i think you are correct to suggest as you did in your opening comments that this in a way set us on a path that became increasingly challenging to manage their had been introduced earlier that year for the government to get involved with weaker financial institutions which we had chosen not to respond to. the markets work and they recapitalize the themselves. this was difficult for me, as you suggest, i had spent almost three decades

the bankruptcy of lehman brothers, and the acquisition of merrill lynch announced on monday september 16. and growing concerns about the viability of aig, which letter culminated in a transaction in which the federal reserve acquired most of aig's equity. on thursday, september 25, in an unusual item, the seizure of the largest savings bank in the united states was announced, washington mutual bank. the subsequent place of washington mutual under fdic s receivership for possibly $1.9 billion. on september 25, a tentative agreement in the u.s. congress regarding the economic establishes a proposal collapse. the combination of these events from earlier in september, the seizure of washington mutual on thursday, the 25th, and the collapse of the congressional agreement precipitated a sharp downward turn in the financial markets. the cost to ensure wachovia is dead as evident by credit default swap for s -- credit default spreads. on friday the 26 there was significant downward pressure on the common stock and deposit base, and as the day progressed, pressures intensified as financial ins