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The U.S. stock market should open slightly lower on Monday. Futures on Standard & Poor's 500 and Nasdaq 100 recoil indeed respectively from 0.31% to 1218.10 points from 0.27% to 2178.75 points. On Friday, Wall Street closed slightly higher. The Dow Jones gleaned 0.08% to 11,444 points, the Nasdaq is up 0.06% to 2578 points and the S & P500 0.39%.

Buoyed by the announcement of support measures by the Fed and the victory of Republicans in the midterm elections in the U.S., the S & P 500 jumped by about 16% since the beginning of September.

However, after crossing without incident a week marked by three key moments – pushing the Republican Congress, the Fed's decision to inject further liquidity and employment figures for October Wall Street likely to experience some difficulties to find a direction in the coming days.In fact, investors have therefore very little evidence to base their belief in the coming days in American markets.

Indeed, the earnings season coming to an end and the calendar is very light this week in macroeconomic indicators. Among the few publications that can influence the ratings this week are, however, later results, performance, Cisco's, Macy's (Wednesday), Walt Disney, Viacom (Thursday), and DR Horton (Friday) and side indicators, the index Preliminary Thomson Reuters-University of Michigan consumer confidence measure Friday.

Financial compartment, which is lagging behind since the beginning of the current upward cycle in U.S. markets, however, could allow Wall Street to find a second wind.Indeed, many analysts expect the Fed will soon allow them to better health facilities to increase the amount of dividends paid. Friday, JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America and the S & P 500 financial stocks had risen in this perspective.

On the foreign exchange market, the euro lost more ground against the dollar in late morning. The European currency was worth 1.3933 dollars against 1.4031 dollars on Friday.On Thursday, the euro had risen above $ 1.42 for the first time since January.

Values to follow

The side of values, the online retailer Amazon may announce the acquisition of online distributor of personal care products and beauty Quidsi for $ 540 million, said Monday morning the Wall Street Journal and The New York Times no fax pay day loan.

Always on the side of values, the transatlantic exchange group NYSE Euronext has seen trading volumes jump 6.2% on year to 7.5 million contracts daily on its derivatives markets in October.This dynamism of derivatives is mainly due to soaring trade on U.S. markets option of NYSE Euronext, which jumped 23.8% to 3.9 million contracts, offsetting lower volumes in Europe.

For its part, the group had consulted AOL Internet Banking Board to help evaluate strategic alternatives, including a merger with its archrival Yahoo, says the Wall Street Journal. AOL already has in the past discussed a possible merger with Yahoo!. At this stage no formal discussions would be ongoing between the two groups, however, says the New York daily. In addition other options not involving Yahoo! would also be considered, says the newspaper.AOL, which made its return on the stock market there is nearly a year after eight years of a disastrous marriage with Time Warner, would be encouraged to marriage by some members of the board of directors of Yahoo! AOL's CEO Tim Armstrong had recently revisited the idea of an association with Yahoo! In September AOL, whose market capitalization is almost ten times lower than that of Yahoo, has announced the acquisition of TechCrunch.

Also note, Boeing announced after market close on Friday, delaying the delivery of its 787 Dreamliner 10 months for several airlines including Korean Air and Air India.The first delivery Nippon Airways, however, is still scheduled to first half of 2011.

Moreover, still in the aerospace sector by Letter to the American Expansion, Hamilton Sundstrand, which is part of United Technologies would be interested in buying the French group Zodiac. The U.S. company, which team including Boeing 787, would be interested in buying Zodiac Aerospace, with whom he collaborated in the past and whose products are complementary to his, wrote Monday Newsletter Expansion.

Alcatel-Lucent, Vallourec are two of ten companies and institutions that have signed on Friday in the seat of the MEDEF, Paris, new contracts with Chinese groups on the second day of the visit of Chinese President Hu Jintao. The French subsidiary of Rolls-Royce Civil Nuclear, the company Sino-French Economic Development Chateauroux Genopole, Alstom Power Systems, Erasteel also announced agreements.

"The climate is good. Chinese and French have expressed their willingness to work together. They share many common analysis of the G20 a few days, "says Jean-Pascal Tricoire, President of the France-China and CEO of Schneider Electric.

Several contracts have to SMEs. "I've already been there a dozen times in China.We signed a contract for one million euros with a large Chinese group to distribute our wines, "said Claude Fournier, president of Fournier father and son (50 employees, 12 million euros of turnover) based in Sancerre.

Chamber of Commerce of Paris has signed an agreement to enable SMEs to expand their operations in China with the support of Chinese giant Huawei Telecommunications. Although France is the second European exporter to China after Germany, Christine Lagarde, Minister of Economy, who attended the book signing in the presence of Chinese Minister of Commerce Chen Deming, noted that the trade deficit racked with China paydayloans.

Investments up

"We're not necessarily very proud when we look at our trade deficit with China is first with 22 billion euros," she said.While advocating "respect for intellectual property" and "equality of treatment between Chinese and French companies," Christine Lagarde defended "a sustained economic relationship based on friendship and the requirement."

While French investments grew 11% in China in 2009, she wanted to see closer cooperation between French and Chinese companies in sustainable development, finance and agribusiness. "The contracts are important. But the orders received each day 4 000 French companies operating in China are equally important, "says Jean-Pascal Tricoire.

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More than 20 billion dollars in contracts with China

The waltz of contracts with China begins. The telecoms equipment maker Alcatel-Lucent will sign three contracts with operators China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom worth a total of 1.1 billion dollars on Friday on the occasion of the visit to France by Chinese President Hu Jintao , which begins Thursday and ends Saturday.

These three framework agreements will allow the OEM to provide networking solutions and application, and integration services and maintenance to the three Chinese operators, Alcatel-Lucent said in a statement.

Moreover, the oil giant Total is set to join the ICC Chinese energy group to build a coal gasification plant in China, reported the daily La Tribune on Tuesday. A contract valued between two and three billion euros.Again, it is during the Chinese president's visit to France that Total has signed a letter of intent with ICC in order to build together a petrochemical production site, according to the business paper. The Chinese head of state should also sign major contracts, including Airbus and Areva.

Total is a minority shareholder in the project and provide a method for manufacturing plastic components from methanol, from himself gasified coal, a technology that aims to produce plastics with coal, natural gas or biomass instead of oil.

Nicolas Sarkozy speaks on the importance of these contracts and the duty to compromise:

The rate of household credit in September reached the lowest level on record, continuing the decline as mortgage side than on consumer credit, according to figures released Wednesday by the Bank of France.

According to the institution, all credits and rate all maturities rose to 4.63% in September. The previous record was set in July 2005 with 4.70%.

The rate of housing loans at fixed rates, all durations combined, it was near the lowest level ever, at 3.52% against 3.50% in November 2005.

The decline also continues for consumer credit, including the average rate reached 5.95% in September low fee payday advance. It has been below this threshold only twice in September and October 2005. In business, after a slight rebound in August, the average rate loans fell in September to 2.96%.It was located in May to the lowest level on record, at 2.82%.

The series of Bank of France only go back to 1990 for these indicators. However, the level of inflation prior to this period suggests that the rate never dropped below these levels before.

BP does not want to be alone to shoulder the bill for the oil spill from the explosion of one of its oil platforms in the Gulf of Mexico. The British oil company claimed $ 1.9 billion to a subsidiary of Japanese trading house Mitsui and Co, Moex Offshore, which owns 10% share of the oil well underwater causing pollution. The colossal sum claimed by BP corresponds to what it sees as the share of its Japanese partner in the costs occasioned by the explosion of the oil rig Deepwater Horizon.

For now, the Japanese subsidiary does not show itself willing to pay. "Given that many investigations are underway to determine the facts and circumstances surrounding the incident and because it is not certain today that Moex Offshore will be obligated to pay, Moex Offshore deferred payment of bills, "the company said.The Japanese company said it had asked for "clarifications" to BP, but had received no response. According to her, "the amount corresponding to 10% Moex Offshore is expected to reach about one billion dollars", barely half of the money claimed by the oil group.

A net profit weighed down by the bill for oil spill

The explanation may lie in the new estimate of the cost of the oil spill from BP overnight pay day loans reassessed. The oil group has raised $ 7.7 billion Tuesday to $ 39.9 billion (28.6 billion euros) its estimate of the likely cost of the spill. And this reassessment has resulted in significant reduction in the quarterly earnings, despite higher prices for oil and gas. BP has indeed registered the third-quarter earnings of $ 1.8 billion, less than 63% from its level in the third quarter of 2009.This net income was however up to one year from 18% to $ 5.53 billion by excluding special items which have weighed on its accounts, the cost of the spill.

BP has set aside $ 32 billion

BP had provisioned 32 billion, including $ 20 billion placed in receivership at the request of U.S. authorities. The sum should ensure all compensation and payments related to the disaster which include the clogging of oil wells, cleaning of coasts and compensation for victims.

Some 4.9 million barrels of crude spilled into the Gulf of Mexico between the accident in April and plugging the leak in September.

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