• A large run of holiday sales offerings crashed the Ebay (NASDAQ:EBAY) website, causing a major weekend web outage

• Tyson Foods (NYSE:TSN) reported better-than-expected earnings of 28 cents a share, beating Zacks estimates by 2 cents, on revenues of $7.2 billion, which exceeded Zacks estimates of $6.85 billion

• India’s Reliance Industries bid $12 billion in cash for Lyondell Bassell when it exits bankruptcy

• Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) is reportedly in discussions with News Corp. (NASDAQ:NWSA) to "de-index" the firm's news websites from Google (NASDAQ:GOOG)

• Coca-Cola (NYSE:KO) announced plans to more than double the number of its bottling plants in China over the next ten years as part of its goal to triple sales to the country

• Hershey (NYSE:HSY) trust encouraged the firm to counter Kraft's (NYSE:KFT) hostile, $16.2 billion bid with its own, $17 billion offer

• According to S&P most US banks are failing to meet adequacy standards comfortably enough to avoid

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Muscle Flex Inc. today invited the public to tune into www.MuscleFlexInc.com for the American Music Awards Online Pre-Show Sunday, November 22, 2009 from 3:00 – 5:00 PM broadcast live from the Red Carpet at the Nokia Theatre with Muscle Flex CEO Danny Alex as the Official Fitness and Lifestyle Expert Commentator. Danny Alex will participate live on the American Music Awards online pre-show with Muscle Flex brands being referenced during his segments which will focus on fitness and lifestyle.

The AMAs will broadcast live from the Nokia Theatre LA LIVE on Sunday, November 22 (8-11 p.m. EASTERN and PACIFIC) on ABC. dcp (dick clark productions) associates Premiere Entertainment will provide production services on the multi-camera red carpet event and USTREAM will power the live stream to a series of dcp developed video widgets. This exclusive pre-show webcast, presented by Coca-Cola, will begin

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Muscle Flex Inc. announced early this morning that its CEO, Danny Alex, will participate live on the American Music Awards online pre-show on November 22, 2009. Muscle Flex brands will be referenced during his segments which will focus on fitness and lifestyle. According to the press release, the introduction was made by Muscle Flex’s marketing partner TLK Fusion.

The AMAs will broadcast live from the Nokia Theatre LA LIVE on Sunday November 22 (8-11 p.m. EASTERN and PACIFIC) on ABC. dcp associates Premiere Entertainment will provide production services on the multi-camera red carpet event and USTREAM will power the live stream to a series of dcp developed video widgets. This exclusive pre-show webcast, presented by Coca-Cola, will begin on Sunday November 22, 2009 at 3:00 PM (PT) / 6:00 PM (ET) and can be viewed on ABC.com, USTREAM.tv/ASNLive, the official AMA fan

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Cereplast, Inc., a pioneer in the manufacture of plastics which derive largely from resins based on plant starches, released news announcing projections for its market sector.

Expecting a ten-fold sales increase in the U.S. bio-plastics market by 2020, the Company cited the $1B sales figures from 2007 and estimates which show that, within ten years, bio-plastics could represent up to an astonishing 30% of the total plastics market.

With the Obama administration leaning heavily toward a green economy and increasing demand from consumers for biodegradable products, Cereplast is poised to cash in on the “green” economy and return substantial value to its investors. Through its proprietary technology and manufacturing know how, Cereplast is ready to capture the explosive growth of this sector, with offerings like Cereplast Compostables® and Cereplast Hybrids®, which are certified compostable in the U.S. and Europe.

CEO and founder of Cereplast, Frederic Scheer, spoke of their breakthrough

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The dollar has clearly been under pressure this year. Most of the graphs of it that you have seen probably look like the first graph below, which shows what the dollar has done against two indexes since the start of the year. The blue line is how the greenback has fared against the major currencies like the Euro and the Yen, and the red line includes those, but also looks at how it has fared against a much broader collection of currencies. Since March 9th, the day the market hit bottom -- and the dollar hit its high for the year -- it is down 14.4% against the major currencies and down 11.5% against the broad basket of currencies. This has a number of implications. For starters, anyone from outside the country has seen nice gains if they invested in the U.S. market, but not nearly as ...

'We will have to take into account this style of dealing with partners in the future, though this scornful approach toward partners mainly affects the Europeans, not us':  Putin reacts to the aborted GM deal.   Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin was in London yesterday to discuss the envisaged issue of $17.8 billion in sovereign eurobonds - the selling of which is a core part of the government's deficit-reducing strategy.  A bond issue would 'be likely to draw keen interest from investors because Russia,[...] is in far better shape financially than a decade ago' says the New York Times.   Kudrin is planning changes to the budget which would see funds originally designed to recapitalize banks redirected to flagging industrial giants (such as Avtovaz) and the jobless, as the economic situation has been less harsh than expected.  In ...

For Immediate Release

Chicago, IL – November 5, 2009 – Zacks.com announces the list of stocks featured in the Analyst Blog. Every day the Zacks Equity Research analysts discuss the latest news and events impacting stocks and the financial markets. Stocks recently featured in the blog include: Wal-Mart (WMT), Target (TGT), Claymore China Small Cap ETF (HAO), Coca-Cola (KO) and Aflac (AFL).

Get the most recent insight from Zacks Equity Research with the free Profit from the Pros newsletter: http://at.zacks.com/?id=5513

Here are highlights from Wednesday’s AnalystBlog:

China Booming Again

The long-term key for China is to generate more consumer demand at home so it is not forever dependent on exports to fuel its growth. This is the mirror image of what the U.S. needs. We cannot forever run trade deficits, consuming more from the rest of the

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The World Bank now estimates that China will grow 8.4% in 2009, up from its June forecast of 7.2% growth. Like the U.S., China embarked on a large fiscal stimulus program, one that relative to the size of its economy is more than three times as large as the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act was. Well, surprise, surprise -- a bigger package has been more effective than a smaller one at lifting economic growth. China, of course, is in a better fiscal position to invest in its economy than the U.S. That is a legacy of the years of fiscal mismanagement in the U.S. going into the crisis, and the fact that China perpetually runs large trade surpluses while the U.S. runs chronic trade deficits. For 2010, as some of the stimulus in China wears off -- but as the private economy there regains its footing -- ...

For Immediate Release

Chicago, IL – October 29, 2009 – Zacks.com releases the latest Zacks Industry Rank. Stocks featured in this week’s analysis include Coca-Cola (KO), PepsiCo (PEP), Kao (KCRPY), Revlon (REV) and Helen of Troy (HELE).

Zacks Industry Rank Analysis is written by Dirk van Dijk, CFA.

This week: Staples Turn to Shine

The Consumer Staples sector has the second-best sector rank and the second-best revisions ratio for this year, following only the small and incoherent Conglomerates sector. (Incoherent by their very nature of being conglomerates).

This is largely due to Consumer Staples consistently surprising on the upside in the third-quarter earnings season so far. Among the S&P 500 firms in the sector, there have been 16 positive surprises and only 1 disappointment through last Friday’s close.

Not only that, but the sector is actually producing honest to goodness earnings growth. Nothing

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One great thing about my position here as Director of Marketing is my extensive contact list. I say that because I have access to thousands of excellent traders, investors, and economists at my finger tips! So when things around the world catch my attention, I can quickly find someone who can give me the skinny on what’s really going down. One of my contacts is Nicholas Vardy, Editor, The Global Guru, and he’s got a MUCH better pulse on the world aboard then I do. That’s why I asked him to give us his reasons why the markets outside the US are doing so well and WHY!

He told me he’d love to get feedback from the Trader’s Blog readers, so let’s not let him down! You can also visit The Global Guru to get his new report on his favorite global picks.

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