Wall Street rises after Alcoa reports earnings

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks rose on Wednesday, rebounding from two days of losses, as investors turned their focus to the first prominent results of the earnings season.


Stocks had retreated at the start of the week from the S&P 500's highest point in five years, hit last Friday, on worries about possible earnings weakness.


Shares of Alcoa Inc were down 0.5 percent to $9.08 after early gains, following the company's earnings release after the bell on Tuesday. The largest U.S. aluminum producer said it expects global demand for aluminum to grow in 2013.


Herbalife Ltd stock rose 4.2 percent to $39.95 in its most active day of trading in the company's history after hedge fund manager Dan Loeb took a large stake in the nutritional supplements seller. Prominent short-seller Bill Ackman had previously accused the company of being a "pyramid scheme," which Herbalife has denied.


Traders have been cautious as the current quarter shaped up like the previous one, with companies recently lowering expectations, said James Dailey, portfolio manager of Team Asset Strategy Fund in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Lower expectations leave room for companies to surprise investors even if their results are not particularly strong.


"The big question and focus is on revenue, and Alcoa had better-than-expected revenue," which calmed the market a little, Dailey said.


Overall, corporate profits were expected to beat the previous quarter's meager 0.1 percent rise. Both earnings and revenues in the fourth quarter are expected to have grown by 1.9 percent, according to Thomson Reuters data.


The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> gained 61.66 points, or 0.46 percent, to 13,390.51. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> rose 3.87 points, or 0.27 percent, to 1,461.02. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> gained 14.00 points, or 0.45 percent, to 3,105.81.


Facebook Inc shares rose above $30 for the first time since July 2012, trading up 5.3 percent at $30.59. Facebook, which has been tight-lipped about its plans after its botched IPO in May, invited the media to its headquarters next week.


Clearwire Corp shares jumped 7.2 percent to $3.13 after Dish Network bid $2.28 billion for the company, beating out a previous Sprint offer and setting the stage for a takeover battle for the wireless service provider that owns crucial mobile spectrum.


Apollo Group Inc slid after heavier early losses, a day after it reported lower student sign-ups for the third straight quarter and cut its operating profit outlook for 2013. Apollo's shares were last off 7.8 percent at $19.32.


Volume was below the 2012 average of 6.42 billion shares traded per day, as 6.10 billion were traded on the New York Stock Exchange, NYSE MKT and Nasdaq.


Advancing stocks outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by 2,014 to 963, while on the Nasdaq advancers beat decliners 1,603 to 859.


(Reporting by Gabriel Debenedetti; additional reporting by Angela Moon; Editing by Nick Zieminski)



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New Evidence to Be Introduced Against Bradley Manning





FORT MEADE, Md. — Military prosecutors preparing to try Pfc. Bradley Manning said on Wednesday that they would introduce evidence that Osama bin Laden requested and received from a Qaeda member some of the State Department cables and military reports that Private Manning is accused of passing to WikiLeaks.




The prosecutors also said they would present logs of Internet chats in February 2010 between Private Manning and Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, including one in which the two men appeared to be “laughing” together about a New York Times article. The March 17, 2010, article said that the Pentagon had listed WikiLeaks as a threat to military operations and security.


The military judge hearing the case, Col. Denise Lind, said Private Manning’s trial would be postponed until at least June 3 to allow consideration of classified information that may be used. The trial is expected to take roughly six weeks.


Private Manning, 25, formerly a low-level intelligence analyst in Iraq, could face a sentence of life without parole if convicted on all charges, including aiding the enemy.


He is accused of the largest unauthorized disclosure of confidential documents in history, including 250,000 diplomatic cables, field reports from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, video footage of an American helicopter gunship killing two Reuters journalists in Iraq and government assessments of the detainees at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.


In a bid for a lower sentence, Private Manning’s lawyers have said he would admit that he supplied the documents to WikiLeaks and committed certain lesser crimes. The judge had previously said some, but not all, of the offers were acceptable under military law.


On Wednesday, defense lawyers adjusted their offer, saying Private Manning would be willing to admit to a list of crimes with a total maximum sentence of 20 years.


If the judge finds the plea legal, prosecutors will have the option of going along with it or proceeding with a trial in an attempt to convict him on some or all of the most serious charges.


The defense has said its witnesses would argue that the material Private Manning gave WikiLeaks was relatively low-grade and outdated information that could not do significant damage to national security. The prosecutors’ challenge to one proposed defense witnesses, Yochai Benkler, a Harvard law professor and Internet expert, led to a revealing discussion about the nature of WikiLeaks.


Colonel Lind, the judge, asked a prosecutor a hypothetical question: If Private Manning had given the documents to The New York Times rather than to WikiLeaks, would he face the same charges?


“Yes, ma’am,” said the prosecutor, Capt. Angel Overgaard.


The New York Times and other mainstream publications published hundreds of the documents Private Manning is accused of leaking. The Justice Department is carrying out an investigation of WikiLeaks to determine whether Mr. Assange or his associates can be charged with a crime.


Media advocates say such a prosecution would be a dangerous precedent for news organizations like The Times that frequently obtain and publish information the government considers classified.


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U.S. Franciscan friars go digital, accept prayer requests via text






NEW YORK (Reuters) – The largest group of Franciscan friars in the United States is offering the faithful a new way to pray in the digital age by accepting prayer requests via text messages.


The Friars of Holy Name Province, who staff 40 parishes and have colleges, soup kitchens and food centers along the eastern seaboard, as well as groups in Peru and Tokyo, are among a few religious groups offering this type of digital service.






Its “Text a Prayer Intention to a Franciscan Friar” initiative, which is described as faith at your fingertips, is a novel way for Roman Catholics to connect.


“People are always saying to friars, ‘Can you say a prayer for me?’ Or ‘Can you remember my mother who has cancer?’” Father David Convertino, the New York-based executive director of development for the Franciscan Friars of the Holy Name Province, said in an interview.


“I was thinking that a lot of people text everything now, even more than email, so why not have people have the ability to ask us to pray for them … by texting.”


The faithful simply text the word ‘prayer’ to 306-44, free of charge. A welcome message from the friars comes up along with a box to type in the request. When the it is sent, the sender receives a reply.


The intentions are received on a website and will be included collectively in the friars’ prayers twice a day and at Mass.


It is one of several ways the friars hope to reach a younger audience, increase the number of faithful and spread the faith. They have already renovated their website and the next step is moving into Facebook and tweeting.


“If the Pope can tweet, friars can text,” said Father David.


The friars also have a presence on LinkedIn and have been streaming some of their church services.


“We’re trying,” said Father David when asked if the friars are well into the digital age, adding that they were “rushing madly into the 19th century.”


Most of the 325 friars, whose average age is about 60, are comfortable with the technology.


“We have a friar who is 80 who was texting today,” said Father David.


The friars are following the example of 85-year-old Pope Benedict, the leader of the world’s 1.2 billion Roman Catholics, whom the Vatican said had 2.1 million followers on Twitter just eight days after sending his first tweet.


The Pontiff tweets in several languages, including Arabic, and plans to add Latin and Chinese to them.


“We’re really excited about this working,” said Father David, about the new program. “I think we’ll be able to keep up (with all the intentions). That’s what we do, we pray for people.”


(Reporting by Patricia Reaney; Editing by Piya Sinha-Roy)


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Kangaroo Gets Loose at Melbourne Airport















01/08/2013 at 08:00 PM EST



Travelers passing through Australia's Melbourne Airport on Monday may have been greeted by an unexpected baggage handler.

At around 7 a.m., a 3-year-old eastern gray kangaroo was spotted in the airport's parking garage, where it hopped around for almost two hours, giving security officers the slip in the process.

Wildlife officer Manfred Zabinskas was then called in to catch the young animal, who was tranquilized in order to be transported to safety. Analyzing the critter, Zabinskas noted he had been away from his natural habitat for some time, and that the romp through the parking garage had done some damage to his feet. Prior to being re-released into the wild, the kangaroo will be looked at by a veterinarian.

This is the second time a kangaroo has paid a visit to the Melbourne Airport. Last October, another marsupial made its way up to the fifth floor of the parking garage before being spotted.

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Report: Death rates from cancer still inching down


WASHINGTON (AP) — Death rates from cancer are continuing to inch down, researchers reported Monday.


Now the question is how to hold onto those gains, and do even better, even as the population gets older and fatter, both risks for developing cancer.


"There has been clear progress," said Dr. Otis Brawley of the American Cancer Society, which compiled the annual cancer report with government and cancer advocacy groups.


But bad diets, lack of physical activity and obesity together wield "incredible forces against this decline in mortality," Brawley said. He warned that over the next decade, that trio could surpass tobacco as the leading cause of cancer in the U.S.


Overall, deaths from cancer began slowly dropping in the 1990s, and Monday's report shows the trend holding. Among men, cancer death rates dropped by 1.8 percent a year between 2000 and 2009, and by 1.4 percent a year among women. The drops are thanks mostly to gains against some of the leading types — lung, colorectal, breast and prostate cancers — because of treatment advances and better screening.


The news isn't all good. Deaths still are rising for certain cancer types including liver, pancreatic and, among men, melanoma, the most serious kind of skin cancer.


Preventing cancer is better than treating it, but when it comes to new cases of cancer, the picture is more complicated.


Cancer incidence is dropping slightly among men, by just over half a percent a year, said the report published by the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. Prostate, lung and colorectal cancers all saw declines.


But for women, earlier drops have leveled off, the report found. That may be due in part to breast cancer. There were decreases in new breast cancer cases about a decade ago, as many women quit using hormone therapy after menopause. Since then, overall breast cancer incidence has plateaued, and rates have increased among black women.


Another problem area: Oral and anal cancers caused by HPV, the sexually transmitted human papillomavirus, are on the rise among both genders. HPV is better known for causing cervical cancer, and a protective vaccine is available. Government figures show just 32 percent of teen girls have received all three doses, fewer than in Canada, Britain and Australia. The vaccine was recommended for U.S. boys about a year ago.


Among children, overall cancer death rates are dropping by 1.8 percent a year, but incidence is continuing to increase by just over half a percent a year. Brawley said it's not clear why.


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Wall Street slips as earnings season gets under way

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks fell on Tuesday, retreating from last week's rally on the "fiscal cliff" deal in Washington, as companies started to report results for the fourth quarter.


After a 4.3 percent jump in the two sessions around the close of the fiscal cliff negotiations, the S&P has declined a bit, with investors finding few catalysts to extend the rally that took the benchmark to five-year highs.


"We had a brief respite, courtesy of what happened on the fiscal cliff deal and the flip of the calendar with new money coming into the market," said Bucky Hellwig, senior vice president at BB&T Wealth Management in Birmingham, Alabama.


Shares of AT&T Inc dropped 1.7 percent to $34.35, making it one of the biggest drags on the S&P 500, after the company said it sold more than 10 million smartphones in the quarter.


This figure beat the same quarter in 2011, but also means increased costs for the wireless service provider. Providers like AT&T pay hefty subsidies to handset makers so that they can offer discounts to customers who commit to two-year contracts.


Fourth-quarter profits are expected to beat the previous quarter's lackluster results, but analyst estimates are down sharply from October. Quarterly earnings are expected to grow by 2.7 percent, according to Thomson Reuters data. Dow component Alcoa, the largest U.S. aluminum producer, reported results after the closing bell.


The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> dropped 55.44 points, or 0.41 percent, to 13,328.85. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> fell 4.74 points, or 0.32 percent, to 1,457.15. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> lost 7.01 points, or 0.23 percent, to 3,091.81.


"The stark reality of uncertainty with regard to earnings, plus the negotiations on the debt ceiling, are there and that doesn't give investors a lot of reason to take bets on the long side," Hellwig said.


With AT&T's fall, the S&P telecom services index <.gspl> was the worst performer of the 10 major S&P sectors, down 2.7 percent.


Sears Holdings shares dropped 6.4 percent to $40.16 a day after the company said Chairman Edward Lampert would take over as CEO from Louis D'Ambrosio, who is stepping down due to a family member's health issue. The U.S. retailer also reported a 1.8 percent decline in quarter-to-date sales at stores open at least a year.


Markets went lower as some of the first reported earnings were weak.


"It doesn't seem to be bouncing back, it might stay here or sell off a little further," said Stephen Carl, head of U.S. equity trading at The Williams Capital Group in New York.


Shares of restaurant-chain operator Yum Brands Inc fell 4.2 percent to $65.04 a day after the KFC parent warned sales in China, its largest market, shrank more than expected in the fourth quarter.


GameStop was one of the worst performers on the S&P 500 as shares slumped 6.3 percent to $23.19 after the video game retailer reported low customer traffic for the holiday season and cut its guidance.


Shares of Monsanto Co gained 2.5 percent to $98.42 after reaching a more than four-year high at $99.99. The world's largest seed company raised its earnings outlook for fiscal year 2013 and posted strong first-quarter results.


Volume was below the 2012 average of 6.42 billion shares traded per day, as 6.19 billion were traded on the New York Stock Exchange, NYSE MKT and Nasdaq.


Declining stocks outnumbered advancing ones on the NYSE by 1,495 to 1,458, while on the Nasdaq decliners beat advancers 1,305 to 1,158.


(Reporting by Gabriel Debenedetti; Editing by Kenneth Barry and Nick Zieminski)



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Aid Groups Report Rising Misery Among Displaced Syrians





New signs of deprivation plaguing Syria’s war-ravaged civilians emerged on Tuesday, with the United Nations saying it is unable to feed a million hungry residents in combat zones and aid agencies reporting an outbreak of violence in a large refugee camp in Jordan, where a winter storm felled tents and left many frustrated inhabitants shivering in a cold rain.




Weather forecasters said another storm was threatening Syria and its neighbors with snow on Wednesday.


The World Food Program, the food agency of the United Nations, said that it was providing food to one and a half million people inside Syria this month but that as many as two and a half million needed help, mostly in areas made hazardous by fighting between insurgents and loyalist forces of President Bashar al-Assad.


“Our partners are overstretched, and there is no capacity to expand operations further,” said a World Food Program spokeswoman, Elizabeth Byrs, at the agency’s Geneva headquarters. “We need more implementing partners.”


She also said acute fuel shortages in Syria had delayed food deliveries and contributed to severe inflation in the price of bread because bakeries needed fuel for their ovens. In the contested city of Aleppo, for example, the price of a kilogram of bread is 250 Syrian pounds, or about $3.50, at least 50 percent higher than in other parts of Syria and at least six times more than its cost when the Syrian conflict began nearly two years ago.


The United Nations appealed last month for $1.5 billion in additional aid to handle the growing humanitarian crisis created by the Syrian conflict, which has left at least 60,000 people dead and is threatening to destabilize the Middle East. More than half a million Syrians have fled to neighboring countries, and the United Nations refugee agency has forecast a doubling of that number by the middle of 2013.


The most heavily burdened neighbors — Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon — have been persistently calling for more international aid, particularly during the cold winter months.


At the Zaatari refugee camp, which shelters 54,000 Syrians in northern Jordan, fighting erupted Tuesday during food distribution after a night of relentless rain inundated parts of the encampment. The number of injuries was unclear.


A statement by the Jordanian police said two aid workers had been hurt. Save the Children, one of the international groups that help the United Nations refugee agency administer the camp, said 11 people had been hurt, more than half of them Save the Children workers.


“The incident followed a night of heavy storms, during which torrential rains and high winds swept away tents and left parts of the camp flooded,” Save the Children said in a statement.


Mohammed Abu Asaker, a regional spokesman for the United Nations refugee agency, acknowledged weather-related problems at the camp, aggravated by a large number of new residents — roughly 9,000 arrivals in the past week.


“It is a difficult situation in the camp,” he said. “There is a frustration from the refugees.”


Ali Bibi, a liaison officer with the refugee agency, said the violence on Tuesday was the latest in a series of at least four clashes among refugees, aid workers and the police in recent weeks.


Melissa Fleming, the chief spokeswoman for the refugee agency in Geneva, said in an e-mail that most of the camp had withstood the rainfall and that aid workers were expediting efforts to move families into prefabricated housing. She attributed tensions among the camp population to “fears of worsening weather conditions, with some families rushing to occupy prefabs out of turn.”


One refugee, who described himself as a colonel in the Syrian Army before he defected, said that even though he was living in one of the prefabricated houses and covering himself with blankets, he could not stay warm.


“The tents are drenched. Kids are crying. Puddles of water are all over,” the refugee, who asked to be identified by only his first name, Mohamad, said in a telephone interview. “I am walking, my shoes are covered with rainwater. I can’t remember being so cold. I don’t even want to think about more than half of the camp living in tents. Something has to be done.”


In Syria on Tuesday, activists reported new violence in the Yarmouk district south of Damascus, a longtime Palestinian refugee encampment convulsed by fighting last month when insurgents temporarily seized control. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based opposition group with a network of contacts in Syria, reported an unspecified number of casualties in the area, as well as shelling by the Syrian military aimed at insurgent pockets in other Damascus suburbs.


In a speech on Sunday, Mr. Assad, whose family has dominated Syria’s politics for four decades, denounced those fomenting the armed uprising against him as foreign stooges, rejected negotiations and instead offered his own plan for political changes, which critics said was meant to keep him in power.


His speech was denounced by the opposition, its Arab and Western supporters, and the United Nations secretary general. On Tuesday, the prime minister of Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a former friend of Mr. Assad’s who has since become a strident foe, added his voice to the criticism.


“It is unimaginable to consider suggestions of a person who has killed his people with bombs, planes and shelling as democratic,” Turkey’s semiofficial Anatolian News Agency quoted Mr. Erdogan as saying.


Rick Gladstone reported from New York, and Nick Cumming-Bruce from Geneva. Reporting was contributed by Jodi Rudoren from Jerusalem; Ranya Kadri from Amman, Jordan; Hwaida Saad from Beirut, Lebanon; and Sebnem Arsu from Istanbul.



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Live blog: Samsung’s new gear at CES 2013






yep thats how apple works now, but can you stream network flash players thru your i pad via apple tv , answer = no , same with google tv. hook the comp directly to the comp get a wireless keayboard and an air mouse , and fyi windows media player can be streamed wirelessly from any pc all you need is a 50 dollar blue ray player , if you want to stream media from a hard drive wirelessly it just has to be one built to the standard like any wd home drive , but dont go usb get one that connects via gigabit


Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News









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Justin Bartha Is Dating Trainer Lia Smith















01/07/2013 at 07:00 PM EST







Lia and Justin in Hawaii New Years Day


Pacific Coast News


Justin Bartha's "mystery woman" is in fact his girlfriend, trainer Lia Smith, a source reveals to PEOPLE.

The pair recently enjoyed a cozy trip to Smith's native Hawaii and were snapped basking in the sun on Maui on New Year's Day, which got people buzzing about her identity.

"They were very cute with each other," says an eyewitness. "They had their arms around each other and were kissing."

The couple also spent time with Smith's parents on Oahu. Bartha, who currently stars on The New Normal, was previously linked to Scarlett Johansson and dated Ashley Olsen for two years before breaking up in 2011.

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Report: Death rates from cancer still inching down


WASHINGTON (AP) — Death rates from cancer are continuing to inch down, researchers reported Monday.


Now the question is how to hold onto those gains, and do even better, even as the population gets older and fatter, both risks for developing cancer.


"There has been clear progress," said Dr. Otis Brawley of the American Cancer Society, which compiled the annual cancer report with government and cancer advocacy groups.


But bad diets, lack of physical activity and obesity together wield "incredible forces against this decline in mortality," Brawley said. He warned that over the next decade, that trio could surpass tobacco as the leading cause of cancer in the U.S.


Overall, deaths from cancer began slowly dropping in the 1990s, and Monday's report shows the trend holding. Among men, cancer death rates dropped by 1.8 percent a year between 2000 and 2009, and by 1.4 percent a year among women. The drops are thanks mostly to gains against some of the leading types — lung, colorectal, breast and prostate cancers — because of treatment advances and better screening.


The news isn't all good. Deaths still are rising for certain cancer types including liver, pancreatic and, among men, melanoma, the most serious kind of skin cancer.


Preventing cancer is better than treating it, but when it comes to new cases of cancer, the picture is more complicated.


Cancer incidence is dropping slightly among men, by just over half a percent a year, said the report published by the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. Prostate, lung and colorectal cancers all saw declines.


But for women, earlier drops have leveled off, the report found. That may be due in part to breast cancer. There were decreases in new breast cancer cases about a decade ago, as many women quit using hormone therapy after menopause. Since then, overall breast cancer incidence has plateaued, and rates have increased among black women.


Another problem area: Oral and anal cancers caused by HPV, the sexually transmitted human papillomavirus, are on the rise among both genders. HPV is better known for causing cervical cancer, and a protective vaccine is available. Government figures show just 32 percent of teen girls have received all three doses, fewer than in Canada, Britain and Australia. The vaccine was recommended for U.S. boys about a year ago.


Among children, overall cancer death rates are dropping by 1.8 percent a year, but incidence is continuing to increase by just over half a percent a year. Brawley said it's not clear why.


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