Nordic exchanges were up led by strong gains in Oslo. Stockholm was down ahead of Riksbank meeting tomorrow. China overtook Japan as the world's second largest economy when measured with gross domestic product as Japan's GDP contracted slightly in the last quarter of 2010. China's trade surplus fell to lowest level in months in December as imports surged. Exports showed strong growth as well, which was taken as evidence of the recovery picking up steam in the OECD countries.
US President Barack Obama shipped budget for fiscal 2012 into congress. The proposal does attempt to cut slightly into mammoth deficit that US is currently running. There are massive renewable energy investments where as many of taxbreaks that oil and gas companies have enjoyed would be gone should the congress approve the budget proposal. Tax breaks for wealthy American would also be gone. The budget proposal includes a lot if infrastructure investments as well. It will certainly not have a cakewalk in the congress as the right wingers would like to see much more substantial cuts in government spending. Eurozone industrial production printed slightly negative growth for December, which, in connection with some Portugal worries and uncertainty over the successor of Trichet in ECB, sent the Euro down a nudge.
MEDA exceeded published full-year forecast for 2010 as the company posted an EBITDA of around 4.3 billion SEK on 37.2% margin. Profit after tax is in the vicinity of 1.4 billion SEK. The company's board proposes doubling the dividend to around 4% yield. Meda has now completed integration of Alaven. Meda's stock gained 13.7% on very heavy volume.
A slew of downgrades coupled with shady comments from CEO Elop that that market has not priced in advantages that Nokia gets from Microsoft union continued the downward momentum of the stock. Ixonos warned that Nokia's new strategy may cut significantly into its earnings. This comes only days after rather upbeat prognosis given in connetion with Q4 report.
KONGSBERG had "a strong finish to a good year". Operating profit of 716 million NOK was well received by investors and KONGSBERG gained nearly 5%. Songa offshore was nearly as strong after its quarterly numbers.
Tiimari is teetering on the brink as sales were still down in January. If Easter holiday sales disappoint, the company may well go under. The rats have been fleeing the ship as institutional investors have been selling the stock hard since last summer. Tecnotree presented its new strategy that failed to impress the investors and highlights the internal disputes the company is engulfed in.
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