General Finance News

(Reuters) – A California judge has dismissed a fraud claim brought by Oracle Corp against Hewlett-Packard Co in the bitter legal battle between the two companies over the Itanium platform.

Last year, Oracle decided to discontinue its support for Itanium, a heavy-duty computing microprocessor, saying that Intel Corp made it clear that the chip was nearing the end of its life and that Intel was shifting its focus to its x86 microprocessor.

HP called Oracles decision “anti-customer” and sued Oracle in California state court in June.

Oracle then brought several claims against HP, including one for fraud. Oracle accused HP of concealing facts during settlement talks to resolve litigation over former HP chief executive Mark Hurds move to Oracle.

Specifically, Oracle said HP did not disclose that it was about to hire Leo Apotheker and chairman Ray Lane, who both have longstanding animosity with Oracle chief executive Larry Ellison. H

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Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) managed to marginally beat earnings expectations this Tuesday morning.  This is the first of the consumer products and medical products companies to report, so this one could have a heavier impact depending on what is said. 

The company beat earnings at $1.13 EPS and sales rose almost 4% to $16.25 billion; estimates were $1.09 EPS and $16.28 billion in sales from Thomson Reuters.  The company noted that operational sales were up 4.0% and its negative currency impact was only 0.1% as domestic sales fell by 3.4% and international sales rose by just over 10% in the quarter.

For the Fiscal Year 2012, J&J sees earnings of $5.05 to $5.15 EPS and that is a bit shy of the $5.21 consensus target based upon operational growth of down slightly to as high as 5.5% and based upon a negative currency impact of around 2.5%.

J&J’s guidance is weighing on the stock.  Shares are indicated down 0.75% at $64.50 against a 52-week trading range of $57.50 to $68.05 and versus a Thomson Reuters consensus price target of $73.00.

The report has remained better than many may have guessed considering all of the product problems before.  Unfortunately, there is little driving force here that stands out as great opportunity.

There’s never a dull moment on Wall Street, especially now that 2012 is tossing us into its first earnings season. Let’s go over some of the items that will help shape the week that lies ahead.

1. Banking on a Bounce: The banking sector got off to a shaky start when JPMorgan Chase (JPM) kicked off the earnings season with a disappointing quarterly report Friday.

We’ll get a clearer picture this week when the rest of the financial services heavyweights chime in.

There’s Citigroup (C) and Wells Fargo (WFC) on Tuesday. Goldman Sachs (GS) and Bank of New York (BK) check in on Wednesday. Bank of America (BAC) is Thursday’s star on the earnings stage.

No one is holding out for a monster showing from these companies. Savers are turned off by historic low interest rates.

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Independent advisors’ appetite for U.S. fixed income exchange-traded funds captured 54% of ETF inflows in 2011, and U.S. equity ETFs saw 33% of flows, but funds tracking international equities and commodities–and gold in particular–lost favor, says a new report released Monday by Charles Schwab.

The top 10% of registered investment advisors (RIAs) by assets under management have the bulk of their ETF assets in U.S. and international equity funds, at 62%, while smaller firms use U.S. fixed income ETFs 50% more than their larger peers, Schwab reported.

Strikingly, the report also shows that RIAs’ appetite for exchange-traded funds grew in 2011 as the overall market’s interest in ETFs declined.

RIAs held $60 billion in ETF assets at Schwab as of Nov. 30, up 5% from the end of 2010, and ETF trade volume among advisors was up 26%. This comp

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FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Banks took a huge 489 billion euros at the European Central Banks first ever offering of three-year funding on Wednesday, raising hope a credit crunch can be avoided and that the money may be used to buy Italian and Spanish bonds.

A total of 523 banks borrowed money at the tender with demand way above the 310 billion euros expected by traders polled by Reuters in the run-up to the operation.

The banks lunge for funding pushed the euro to a one-week high versus the dollar and sparked a rally in stocks.

The three-year loans are the ECBs latest bold attempt to ease the euro zones troubles. It is the most the bank has ever pumped into the financial system, topping the near 450 billion it injected with its first one-year loans back in 2009.

Its hope is that the ultra-cheap and ultra-long funding will have a range of beneficial effects, including bolstering trust in banks, easing the threat of a credit crunch and tempting banks to buy Italian and Spanish bonds, thereby calming markets and easing the currency blocs sovereign debt crisis.

“The take-up was massive … m

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Getting a dividend of over 4% from a technology company is no simple task, even as many technology leaders have decided that higher dividends can finally start to be used to reward their shareholders.  This is where Digital Realty Trust Inc. (NYSE: DLR) comes into play.

24/7 Wall St. refers to Digital Realty as “The Landlord of the Cloud and Technology.”  For months and months this was our top dividend pick for anything tied to technology.  While it is a real estate investment trust, or a REIT, the company houses many datacenters, storage farms, and technology outfits as its key tenants.  The problem is that this upside and valuation has currently diminished to the point where our internal risk-reward metrics.  We have now removed it from our top dividends portfolio and it is not a part of the 24/7 Wall St. 2012 Mod

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If the federal government could nail Al Capone on tax charges, euthanasia device maker Sharlotte Hydorn, 92, didn’t stand a chance.

Hydorn, of El Cajon, Calif., pleaded guilty last week in federal court to a charge of failing to file federal income tax returns since 2007 on $150,000 in earnings from various sources, including the profits from selling kits designed to help people end their lives.

Under the terms of the plea agreement, Hydorn has agreed to pay approximately $26,000 in back taxes and to quit selling the devices. She could have faced up to one year in jail and/or a $100,000 fine, but was spared jail time in part because of her age, according to Assistant U.S. Attorney Melanie K. Pierson.

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It’s an oldie but goodie; part of a perpetual debate. What is the appropriate “replacement rate” to target when saving for retirement?

Conventional wisdom pegs it at 80%. But Reuters’ Linda Stern wonders if, despite the mountain of reporting about America’s lack of retirement readiness, it might be too much.

“[T]here’s reason to believe that oft-quoted 80% figure is wildly on the high side,” Stern writes. “That, in turn, makes the retirement calculations based upon it also wildly off. And that means

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