March 19, 2024

Wall Street Shares Inch Higher

Wall Street inched higher on Monday as earlier weakness prompted some buying and investors pushed the Standard Poor’s 500-stock index to its highest intraday level since October 2007.

By midday, the Dow Jones industrial average and the S..P 500 were trading in positive territory, continuing last week’s rally, which took the Dow to record highs. The S.P. 500 is only about 1 percent away from its all-time closing high.

In afternoon trading, the S.P. and the Dow were both up about 0.3 percent, while the Nasdaq composite was 0.1 percent higher.

Wall Street’s “fear gauge” — the CBOE Volatility Index, known as the VIX — dropped 5.5 percent to 11.90, the lowest level since April 2007.

Equities have rallied strongly since the beginning of the year, helped by signs of improvement in the economy, and pullbacks have been short lived as investors look to get into the market.

“There’s real belief in this rally,” said Tim Ghriskey, chief investment officer of Solaris Group in Bedford Hills, N.Y.

“There are lots of investors out there looking for opportunities to put more money to work in equities, and they’re using these little pullbacks we’ve had – and there haven’t been many – as purchasing opportunities.”

In the first three months of the year, the benchmark S.P. has gained nearly 9 percent.

The Dow has climbed 10 percent for the year.

Wall Street had traded slightly lower earlier in the day as Italy’s credit downgrade and disappointing Chinese economic data gave investors a reason to pause.

BlackBerry shares listed in the United States surged 11 percent after American carriers said they would soon begin selling the company’s long-delayed Z10 device. The stock shot up 11.1 percent to $14.51.

Dell shares were up 1.3 percent at $14.34 after the company agreed to give Carl Icahn a closer look at its books. The move came less than a week after the activist investor joined a growing chorus of opposition to plans by the computer maker’s founder, Michael Dell, to take the company private. Monday’s trading was above the take-private offer price of $13.65.

Genworth Financial shares jumped 6.3 percent to $10.46 after a report by Barron’s that the mortgage insurer’s stock could almost double in the next year, boosted by gains in mortgage and healthcare pricing.

In contrast, Dick’s Sporting Goods fell 10 percent to $45.53 after the retailer reported lower-than-expected fourth-quarter results and gave a disappointing forecast.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/12/business/economy/daily-stock-market-activity.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Europe Gives Airlines Room on Carbon Limits

The European Union’s existing cap-and-trade system limits the carbon dioxide emissions of power plants and big factories in the bloc by issuing permits for each ton of carbon they can emit. Each company is allocated permits to emit a set amount of carbon dioxide. They can buy extra credits if they exceed that limit; if they emit less, they can sell credits.

Next year, all airlines flying to and from Europe will be brought into the program, which is currently being challenged in court by some American carriers.

Jos Delbeke, the European Union’s director general for climate action, said Monday that carriers would be allowed to emit 85 percent of their limit — or cap — free for the first year to ease the economic impact on the industry. The cap is set at 97 percent of the average aviation emissions from 2004 to 2006.

For the 2013-20 period, the cap will fall to 95 percent of that number, and the free allowances will decline to 82 percent.

Mr. Delbeke said airlines would be allowed to pass on to travelers the additional cost of those permits. He estimated the per ticket cost would be 2 to 12 euros ($2.70 to $16.20).

The European Union’s climate action commissioner, Connie Hedegaard, said the free allowances would save the aviation industry more than 20 billion euros over the next decade.

“With these potential revenues, airlines could invest in modernizing their fleets, improving fuel efficiency and using non-fossil aviation fuel,” she said.

The Air Transport Association of America, which represents airlines based in the United States, together with United Continental and American Airlines, have taken the European Union to court, arguing that imposing emission caps on non-European carriers breaches international law.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/27/business/global/europe-gives-airlines-some-room-on-carbon-limits.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

U.S. and Europe Battle Over Carbon Fees for Airlines

Until now, the United States and Europe have taken a to-each-his-own attitude on how to handle the greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to global warming, leaving American consumers largely immune to aggressive European environmental regulation and its costs. But come 2012, Americans flying to Europe are likely to be paying indirectly for the emissions their trips create — chiefly through steeper fares, although uncertainty persists about how much higher they will be.

American carriers and air freight companies will also face a new type of competition, because the “cleanest” airlines will pay less in emissions fees.

The United States airline industry has fought aggressively against inclusion in the European Union Emissions Trading System, most recently in a lawsuit filed before the European Court of Justice, the European Union’s highest court. It argues that the European Union has no legal right to regulate American carriers or flight emissions that are released over other countries or into international airspace as planes make their way across the ocean. A ruling is not expected until late this year at the earliest.

The issue has also created diplomatic tensions. “The European Union is imposing this on U.S. carriers without our agreement,” Wendell Albright, director of the Office of Aviation Negotiations at the State Department, said in an interview on Wednesday. “It is for the U.S. to decide on targets or appropriate action for U.S. airlines with respect to greenhouse gas emissions.”

He said the Obama administration had voiced its displeasure to the European Union and was “exploring various options” to address the standoff.

The European emissions trading system relies on a cap-and-trade mechanism in which companies that exceed their government-mandated targets for reducing their carbon dioxide emissions must buy carbon permits from businesses that earned them by emitting less than they were allowed. New industries enter the program each year.

American carriers project that they will end up spending $3.1 billion on the carbon permits by 2020. That could ultimately raise the price of a trans-Atlantic ticket as much as $57 for a flight from New York to London, according to some industry estimates.

The European Union is “attempting to regulate the airlines of the world,” said Nancy Young, vice president for environmental affairs at the Air Transport Association, the largest airline industry group in the United States. “The plan violates international law.”

European Union officials are standing firm, saying that adding civil aviation and cargo flights to Europe’s expanding emissions trading system is both legal and nonnegotiable.

“In Europe, we’re trying to do something with climate change and we now have emissions targets for sector after sector,” said Connie Hedegaard, the European Union’s commissioner for climate action. “We now include power producers, we now include manufacturing, so how can we not include aviation?”

Under the current plan, all airlines flying into airports within the European Union will have to reduce their emissions next year by 3 percent from average levels between 2004 and 2006, or buy carbon permits to make up the difference.

Ms. Hedegaard added that was unfair to require European airlines to pay for their pollution on routes that United Airlines or Air China flew for free.

At a hearing before the European Court of Justice last month, lawyers from the European Union and environmental groups said inclusion was legal, comparing the emissions fees to a landing charge or to a prohibition on overly noisy aircraft.

Annie Petsonk, a lawyer who attended for the Environmental Defense Fund and who previously worked for the Justice Department, said: “The E.U. system is not a tax — if you don’t want to pay you can reduce your emissions. ”

At the heart of the dispute are the disparate political positions taken by Europe and the United States on appropriate measures for reining in greenhouse gas emissions and the gravity of climate change. Carbon dioxide emissions from air travel are one of the fastest-growing sources of the gases that scientists say are warming the planet, and they have an outsize effect because they are released high in the atmosphere, scientists say.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/28/business/energy-environment/us-air-carriers-brace-for-emissions-fees-in-europe.html?partner=rss&emc=rss