Financial news on August 16, 2007
Business and Financial news
Nestlé, one of the world’s largest food companies, was stripped of its AAA rating yesterday by Fitch Ratings and Moody’s Investors Service after the company said it planned to repurchase almost $21 billion of stock. Read more..
The maker of scientific testing equipment cut its sales and profit forecasts due to slowing demand in Asia. Read more..
Shunning low-cost call centers and e-mail-based service, Netflix is hoping to use customer service as a strategic weapon against Blockbuster’s rival DVD-mailing service. Read more..
Stocks staged a late rally today on Wall Street after a day of wild swings as investors weighed the impact of the crunch in the American credit market. Read more..
The Dow Jones industrial average closed down 167.45 points after having stayed in positive territory for most of the day. Read more..
The Internet phone service Skype suffers an outage and may stay down for a whole day. Read more..
Some games are performing better on the Xbox 360 than on the PlayStation 3. Are developers having trouble mastering the PS3’s quirks? Read more..
Another explanation for the slow pace of video game releases for the Sony PlayStation 3. Read more..
Why does all the fine print on the newest, fastest network routers say “draft specification”? What does this mean if I want to buy a new router? Read more..
If you make your own party-mix CDs with iTunes, you can use the program’s print options to create a stylish song list for the jewel case. Read more..
Stock Markets
Values are reported in US Dollars
| Stock | Ticker symbol | Open | High | Low | Close | Volume |
| Intel | INTC | 23.23 | 23.59 | 22.09 | 23.10 | 118M |
| Cisco Systems | CSCO | 29.78 | 30.05 | 28.58 | 29.30 | 103M |
| Microsoft | MSFT | 27.88 | 28.35 | 27.51 | 27.81 | 81.4M |
| Apple | AAPL | 117.01 | 118.50 | 111.62 | 117.05 | 66.7M |
| Pfizer | PFE | 23.36 | 23.57 | 23.13 | 23.39 | 66.1M |
| General Electric | GE | 36.51 | 37.29 | 36.20 | 37.20 | 65.7M |
| JPMorgan Chase | JPM | 42.75 | 45.90 | 42.16 | 45.47 | 51.4M |
| ExxonMobil | XOM | 80.85 | 81.93 | 78.76 | 80.67 | 49.4M |
| Wells Fargo & Co. | WFC | 33.07 | 35.96 | 32.90 | 35.40 | 44.7M |
| Oracle Corp. | ORCL | 19.11 | 19.48 | 18.81 | 19.14 | 42.5M |
| AT&T Inc. | T | 37.60 | 38.24 | 36.53 | 37.92 | 38.6M |
| Home Depot | HD | 33.36 | 33.72 | 31.85 | 32.82 | 37.7M |
| Wal-Mart Stores | WMT | 43.05 | 43.95 | 42.92 | 43.50 | 36.3M |
| HP Inc. | HPQ | 46.24 | 46.31 | 43.64 | 46.05 | 35.6M |
| Comcast | CMCSA | 25.07 | 25.49 | 24.25 | 24.98 | 30.3M |
| ConocoPhillips | COP | 76.01 | 77.87 | 73.75 | 77.28 | 29.1M |
| Johnson & Johnson | JNJ | 60.80 | 61.93 | 60.73 | 61.63 | 24M |
| Verizon Communications | VZ | 40.25 | 40.58 | 39.27 | 40.23 | 23.6M |
| Procter & Gamble | PG | 62.53 | 64.79 | 62.53 | 64.03 | 22.6M |
| Merck | MRK | 49.60 | 49.97 | 48.11 | 49.46 | 20.3M |
| Chevron | CVX | 79.79 | 81.96 | 78.25 | 81.39 | 19.4M |
| Walt Disney & Co. | DIS | 31.35 | 32.63 | 31.25 | 32.58 | 19.4M |
| Amgen | AMGN | 49.49 | 50.01 | 48.54 | 49.41 | 17.4M |
| Abbott Laboratories | ABT | 52.25 | 52.42 | 50.78 | 51.86 | 17.4M |
| Alphabet | GOOGL | 492.02 | 496.43 | 480.46 | 491.52 | 17.3M |
| Schlumberger | SLB | 85.54 | 86.95 | 81.26 | 85.84 | 17.3M |
| Bristol-Myers Squibb | BMY | 27.59 | 28.20 | 26.87 | 27.37 | 17M |
| International Business Machines | IBM | 110.98 | 111.42 | 103.70 | 109.69 | 16.7M |
| Altria | MO | 65.75 | 66.36 | 64.72 | 66.36 | 16.6M |
| Boeing | BA | 95.20 | 95.20 | 90.08 | 92.74 | 14.7M |
| Coca-Cola | KO | 53.50 | 54.29 | 52.83 | 53.58 | 14.5M |
| McDonald's | MCD | 46.85 | 48.35 | 46.64 | 48.07 | 10.9M |
| Amazon | AMZN | 72.00 | 73.24 | 70.05 | 72.79 | 10.8M |
| Gilead Sciences | GILD | 37.40 | 38.85 | 37.04 | 37.60 | 10.4M |
| Pepsico | PEP | 66.51 | 68.57 | 66.50 | 68.37 | 9.7M |
| UnitedHealth Group | UNH | 48.60 | 49.13 | 47.97 | 48.86 | 9.66M |
| United Technologies | UTX | 70.59 | 71.40 | 69.00 | 71.08 | 9.44M |
| Union Pacific | UNP | 106.51 | 107.27 | 99.38 | 105.00 | 8.16M |
| 3M | MMM | 83.21 | 86.28 | 83.21 | 85.40 | 6.72M |
| Berkshire Hathaway | BRK.B | 3669.00 | 3797.00 | 3665.00 | 3791.50 | 43.5K |
Exchange Rates of August 16, 2007
| Currencies | Exchange Rates | ||
| US Dollar | Japanese Yen | 1 USD = 113.870 JPY | 1 JPY = 0.009 USD |
| US Dollar | Canadian Dollar | 1 USD = 1.076 CAD | 1 CAD = 0.929 USD |
| US Dollar | Swiss Franc | 1 USD = 1.216 CHF | 1 CHF = 0.822 USD |
| US Dollar | Chinese Yuan | 1 USD = 7.603 CNY | 1 CNY = 0.132 USD |
| Euro | Japanese Yen | 1 EUR = 152.910 JPY | 1 JPY = 0.007 EUR |
| Euro | Pound Sterling | 1 EUR = 0.677 GBP | 1 GBP = 1.477 EUR |
| Euro | Australian Dollar | 1 EUR = 1.697 AUD | 1 AUD = 0.589 EUR |
| Euro | Canadian Dollar | 1 EUR = 1.445 CAD | 1 CAD = 0.692 EUR |
| Euro | Swiss Franc | 1 EUR = 1.633 CHF | 1 CHF = 0.612 EUR |
| Japanese Yen | Pound Sterling | 1 JPY = 0.443 GBP | 1 GBP = 2.259 JPY |
| Japanese Yen | Australian Dollar | 1 JPY = 1.109 AUD | 1 AUD = 0.902 JPY |
| Japanese Yen | Canadian Dollar | 1 JPY = 0.945 CAD | 1 CAD = 1.059 JPY |
| Japanese Yen | Swiss Franc | 1 JPY = 1.068 CHF | 1 CHF = 0.936 JPY |
| Pound Sterling | Australian Dollar | 1 GBP = 2.506 AUD | 1 AUD = 0.399 GBP |
| Pound Sterling | Canadian Dollar | 1 GBP = 2.134 CAD | 1 CAD = 0.469 GBP |
| Pound Sterling | Swiss Franc | 1 GBP = 2.411 CHF | 1 CHF = 0.415 GBP |
| Australian Dollar | Canadian Dollar | 1 AUD = 0.851 CAD | 1 CAD = 1.175 AUD |
| Australian Dollar | Swiss Franc | 1 AUD = 0.962 CHF | 1 CHF = 1.040 AUD |
| Canadian Dollar | Swiss Franc | 1 CAD = 1.130 CHF | 1 CHF = 0.885 CAD |
See what else happened on August 16, 2007