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- Stocks are backing off the rally that took the Dow over 14,000 on Friday for the first time since 2007. All the major indexes are in negative territory in today's early going on Wall Street.
- The Commerce Department says factory orders increased in December even though companies trimmed their orders for core capital goods, a category that signals business investment plans. Factory orders rose 1.8 percent in December from November, while demand for core goods dipped 0.3 percent. Orders for durable goods rose 4.3 percent but orders for non-durable goods such as petroleum products declined 0.3 percent.
- Oracle is acquiring the network gear company Acme Packet for about $2.1 billion. The software giant says the acquisition will enable it to bolster the communications package it offers to customers with the acquisition. Acme makes phone and data network equipment that's used by more than 1,900 service providers and enterprises around the world. Oracle will pay $29.25 per share for Acme, a 22 percent premium over its closing stock price on Friday.
- Britain's treasury chief is warning that country's banks that they face being broken up if they fail to protect their retail operations from their riskier investment arms. George Osborne told executives from JPMorgan that the days of banks being "too big to fail" are over in Britain, and that taxpayers shouldn't be expected to bail out the lenders.
- A review by the European Commission and the European Central Bank says a program to help Spain's banks is on track, although the country still faces significant economic challenges. The review concludes that banking sector conditions "have broadly stabilized" since the start of the program in June and access to credit markets has improved for both the government and for private borrowers.
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