Weekly Wrap Up
Markets finish an up and down week in a stalemate, with exchanges mixed on the week. Friday saw significant losses, dragging down potential weekly gains, on the heels of a low payroll report. No new jobs were added in the US in August, the first time this has happened in the past 11 months. In a more positive light, consumer spending rose at its fastest pace in months for July, and August retail sales were able to weather the storm of economic and natural disasters.In corporate news, US auto sales accomplished another solid month, with General Motors (GM: Charts, News), Ford (F: Charts, News) and Chrysler all reporting sales increases. More Market News
Economic News
August retail sales stand up to natural, economic shocks
Hurricane Irene drove away shoppers from U.S. clothing and department stores in the last week of August, weighing on monthly retail results, even as chains selling storm supplies saw a temporary boost.The final tally Thursday, based on reports from 23 retailers, showed sales at stores open at least a year rose 4.4 percent in August, just shy of the 4.6 percent analysts expected, according to Thomson Reuters. (Source: Chicago Tribune) Click here to read the full article
Hurricane Irene drove away shoppers from U.S. clothing and department stores in the last week of August, weighing on monthly retail results, even as chains selling storm supplies saw a temporary boost.The final tally Thursday, based on reports from 23 retailers, showed sales at stores open at least a year rose 4.4 percent in August, just shy of the 4.6 percent analysts expected, according to Thomson Reuters. (Source: Chicago Tribune) Click here to read the full article
US consumer spending data allays recession worries
U.S. consumer spending rose at its fastest pace in five months in July, a further sign the economy is not falling back into recession, although manufacturing activity in Texas almost stalled this month.Consumer spending increased 0.8 percent on strong demand for motor vehicles as Japan-related supply restraints faded, a Commerce Department report showed on Monday. Spending had slipped 0.1 percent in June. (Source: Reuters) Click here to read the full article
U.S. consumer spending rose at its fastest pace in five months in July, a further sign the economy is not falling back into recession, although manufacturing activity in Texas almost stalled this month.Consumer spending increased 0.8 percent on strong demand for motor vehicles as Japan-related supply restraints faded, a Commerce Department report showed on Monday. Spending had slipped 0.1 percent in June. (Source: Reuters) Click here to read the full article
Business News
August auto sales defy consumer caution
Auto sales rose slightly in August from a month earlier, defying forecasts for a slowdown in a month that began with a plunge on Wall Street and ended with an East Coast hurricane.Detroit automakers posted double-digit percentage gains from year-earlier sales, helped by stronger sales of newer small cars like the Chevrolet Cruze and more fuel-efficient SUVs including the Ford (F: Charts, News)Escape. (Source: Reuters) Click here to read the full article
Auto sales rose slightly in August from a month earlier, defying forecasts for a slowdown in a month that began with a plunge on Wall Street and ended with an East Coast hurricane.Detroit automakers posted double-digit percentage gains from year-earlier sales, helped by stronger sales of newer small cars like the Chevrolet Cruze and more fuel-efficient SUVs including the Ford (F: Charts, News)Escape. (Source: Reuters) Click here to read the full article
Halliburton sues BP over Macondo claim
Halliburton (HAL: Charts, News), the US oil services company, has filed a defamation lawsuit against BP (BP: Charts, News) over last year’s Gulf of Mexico accident, accusing it of providing inaccurate information that was critical to its cementing work on the well that subsequently exploded.Halliburton said it had filed on Friday claims against BP “in Texas state court for negligent misrepresentation, business disparagement and defamation.” The company has also amended its claims against BP in the multidistrict litigation in New Orleans, Louisiana, in connection with the accident, to include fraud. (Source: Financial Times) Click here to read the full article
Halliburton (HAL: Charts, News), the US oil services company, has filed a defamation lawsuit against BP (BP: Charts, News) over last year’s Gulf of Mexico accident, accusing it of providing inaccurate information that was critical to its cementing work on the well that subsequently exploded.Halliburton said it had filed on Friday claims against BP “in Texas state court for negligent misrepresentation, business disparagement and defamation.” The company has also amended its claims against BP in the multidistrict litigation in New Orleans, Louisiana, in connection with the accident, to include fraud. (Source: Financial Times) Click here to read the full article
Technology Focus
Microsoft Targets Salesforce Users With Financial Incentives
On the eve of arch-rival Salesforce.com’s (CRM: Charts, News) Dreamforce conference, Microsoft (MSFT: Charts, News) is offering rebates of $150-per-seat for customers who subscribe to the vendor’s Dynamics CRM online application.Microsoft is hoping the “Cloud CRM for Less” offer will entice businesses and organizations that use CRM applications from Oracle (ORCL: Charts, News), SAP (SAP: Charts, News) and — especially — Salesforce. (Source: CRN.com) Click here to read the full article
On the eve of arch-rival Salesforce.com’s (CRM: Charts, News) Dreamforce conference, Microsoft (MSFT: Charts, News) is offering rebates of $150-per-seat for customers who subscribe to the vendor’s Dynamics CRM online application.Microsoft is hoping the “Cloud CRM for Less” offer will entice businesses and organizations that use CRM applications from Oracle (ORCL: Charts, News), SAP (SAP: Charts, News) and — especially — Salesforce. (Source: CRN.com) Click here to read the full article
Amazon ‘Kindle Scribe’ Tablet to Let You Write EBooks?
So you’ve been following the rumors about an Amazon (AMZN: Charts, News) Kindle tablet of some kind that’s supposed to come out later this year. You’ve heard it’s supposed to be fast, cheap and will possibly come in two sizes, like today’s Kindle and Kindle DX e-readers. You know it’ll probably run Android, Google’s (GOOG: Charts, News) open-source operating system for smartphones and tablets, and you also know it’ll probably use Amazon’s “Appstore for Android” instead of the Android Market.Well, according to Desire Athow of ITProPortal, Amazon’s just registered two domain names, or website addresses. Specifically, kindlescribe.com and kindlescribes.com. This tells us the “Kindle tablet” will probably be called the Kindle Scribe. But what else does it tell us about it? (Source: Yahoo News) Click here to read the full article
So you’ve been following the rumors about an Amazon (AMZN: Charts, News) Kindle tablet of some kind that’s supposed to come out later this year. You’ve heard it’s supposed to be fast, cheap and will possibly come in two sizes, like today’s Kindle and Kindle DX e-readers. You know it’ll probably run Android, Google’s (GOOG: Charts, News) open-source operating system for smartphones and tablets, and you also know it’ll probably use Amazon’s “Appstore for Android” instead of the Android Market.Well, according to Desire Athow of ITProPortal, Amazon’s just registered two domain names, or website addresses. Specifically, kindlescribe.com and kindlescribes.com. This tells us the “Kindle tablet” will probably be called the Kindle Scribe. But what else does it tell us about it? (Source: Yahoo News) Click here to read the full article
Your Money
How To Pick The Right Idea For Your Startup
As a current startup founder, one of the most common questions I get is how to come up with a good startup idea. I most often get this question from non-technical or semi-technical founders who would probably regard themselves as outsiders to Silicon Valley.Picking which idea to work on is the most important decision a founding team can make. Execution is important, but is too amorphous a concept to be called a decision by itself. (Source: OnStartUps.com) Click here to read the full article
As a current startup founder, one of the most common questions I get is how to come up with a good startup idea. I most often get this question from non-technical or semi-technical founders who would probably regard themselves as outsiders to Silicon Valley.Picking which idea to work on is the most important decision a founding team can make. Execution is important, but is too amorphous a concept to be called a decision by itself. (Source: OnStartUps.com) Click here to read the full article
People Are the Puck
The Great One’s well-known words are often repeated in corporate corridors during discussions about understanding market trends. That is typically where the conversation comes to an abrupt end, because few can elaborate on how to anticipate these trends with any reliability and predictability.The reality these discussions generally miss is that people are the puck. If you want to know how to be best positioned for business success, you have to understand where they are going. Everything else is secondary, dynamic, and highly arbitrary. Think about it. Technologies will change, distribution channels for content will change, usage environments will change. People stay more or less the same. They stay the same but are never simple. People (consumers) are both logical and irrational, motivated by opportunity and emotion, full of contradiction, impacted by economic conditions, and often difficult to define. (Source: Harvard Business Review Blog) Click here to read the full article
The Great One’s well-known words are often repeated in corporate corridors during discussions about understanding market trends. That is typically where the conversation comes to an abrupt end, because few can elaborate on how to anticipate these trends with any reliability and predictability.The reality these discussions generally miss is that people are the puck. If you want to know how to be best positioned for business success, you have to understand where they are going. Everything else is secondary, dynamic, and highly arbitrary. Think about it. Technologies will change, distribution channels for content will change, usage environments will change. People stay more or less the same. They stay the same but are never simple. People (consumers) are both logical and irrational, motivated by opportunity and emotion, full of contradiction, impacted by economic conditions, and often difficult to define. (Source: Harvard Business Review Blog) Click here to read the full article
