By Agency Reporter

Tuesday, 8 Feb 2011

NEW YORK: Stock index futures pointed to a higher open for Wall Street on Monday, with futures for the Standard and Poor 500, Nasdaq futures and Dow Jones futures up by 0.3 to 0.4 per cent, Reuters reported.

The S&P 500 posted its best week in nine on Friday as investors rotated into defensive and lagging sectors, with both the Dow Jones and the S&P 500 making new two and half years highs. Analysts see further gains in store for equity markets as economic growth accelerates.

Some confidence in the recovery in the labor market was fueled by data on Friday that showed United States unemployment fell to nine per cent, its lowest level since April 2009, though the economy only added a weaker-than-expected 36,000 jobs.

In company news, France’s Sanofi-Aventis and US biotech Genzyme kept investors in suspense about their $20bn transatlantic pharmaceuticals merger on Monday, as sources predicted a deal within days.

Nasdaq OMX Group said on Saturday that it found “suspicious files” on its US computer servers, but said there was no evidence hackers had accessed or acquired customer information or that its trading platforms were compromised.

Struggling US Internet company AOL Incorporated has agreed to buy The Huffington Post, the influential and rapidly growing news, analysis and lifestyle website, for $315m, it said on Monday.

US regulators will propose on Monday that executives at the largest financial institutions have half of their bonuses deferred for at least three years as part of efforts to curb excessive risk taking, according to two people familiar with the proposal.

Google Incorporated wants to avoid a lengthy legal battle with European Union regulators investigating its market dominance, the Sunday Telegraph quoted its chief executive as saying.

Time Warner Cable Incoporated is considering selling part of its IPC Media magazine unit, British newspaper, The Telegraph, reported on its website on Sunday.

Ford Motor Company will increase production for deliveries to its US dealers by 13 per cent in the first quarter of 2011 and may add third shifts to some of its plants, Ford sales executives said on Sunday.

North Sea Brent crude oil futures jumped back above $100 a barrel on lingering worries that political unrest in Egypt could spread to other markets of the Middle East and disrupt energy supplies.

Source: Punch