Wake Up Call - Jan 25

Good Morning. The time is 9:10 a.m. and major U.S. equity markets are mixed this morning. While a report from Ford drives the Dow and S&P 500 futures lower, Ebay's earnings news has the NASDAQ looking up.

Asia:
Hang Seng Index -0.73%; Shanghai/Shenzhen 300 -3.3%; NIKKEI 225 -0.28%; BSE SENSEX 30 +1.22%; KRX 100 -0.18%; Ho Chi Minh -2.71%

U.K. & Europe:
DJ STOXX 50 Index +0.13%; FTSE 100 -0.3%; CAC 40 -0.25%; DAX -0.17%; Russian RTS Index +1.21%

KEY HEADLINE NEWS

• While Ford's earnings miss is driving the S&P 500 lower, Ebay's report is driving the NASDAQ higher in pre-market activity. AT&T reported strong results as well.
• China's GDP growth, at 10.7% in 2006, exceeded its growth of 10.4% in 2005. However, it appears that Chinese government efforts, combined with the slowing of the U.S. economy, have been a bit effective in controlling economic expansion. China's GDP growth in the fourth quarter calmed to 10.4%. The nation with the world's fourth largest economy has raised interest rates a couple times and increased reserve requirements for banks in an effort to restrain speculation and control inflation. Still, consumer prices showed a 2.8% jump in December, compared to 1.5% for all of 2006.
• Business optimism in Germany, the world's third largest economy, decreased in January. However, January's measure was not far off December's mark, which was the highest since German reunification began in 1991. Still, directional change matters, and the DAX is lower today by 0.17%.
• Japan's trade surplus missed expectations, while increasing 22.8% on strong import growth and amid speculation that U.S. market demand weakness played a role. Japan, as a developed market, is finding increasing export competition from emerging markets in its region, and import growth of 7.6% is undeniable, despite blame attributed to commodity prices. In the future, automobile exports may be cannibalized some by Toyota's efforts to shift more production to U.S.-based assembly plants.
• A Russian smuggler was arrested in Tbilisi, Georgia attempting to sell 3.5 ounces of highly enriched uranium, while claiming he had much more.

We urge you to read our section within the sidebar, entitled "Headline News", for further important information for traders and investors.

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