Monday Evening Business Brief

• Wall Street celebrated Thanksgiving a bit early today, sending stocks up sharply. The Dow gained 208 points to 12,796. The S&P added 27 points, while the Nasdaq composite surged nearly 63 points.
• Intel's board plans to look for successors both inside the company and externally as well. That's after CEO Paul Otellini announced that he is retiring in May, a decision that the world's largest chipmaker says was entirely his own.
• The maker of Twinkies, Hostess Brands, and its second largest union are to try mediation as a means of seeing if it doesn't have to go out of business. Hostess has sought to shed its assets in bankruptcy court citing a crippling strike.
• Federal labor officials vow to decide quickly whether to support a request from Wal-Mart to stop a union-backed group from encouraging worker walk-outs at hundreds of stores on Friday. The world's largest retailer has filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board to keep the group called "OUR Walmart' from holding protests.
• The price of oil closed at its highest point in nearly a month in reaction to rising Middle East tensions and less concern about the "fiscal cliff".  Benchmark crude rose $2.36 to settle at $89.28 in New York.

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