Morning Weakness

Morning News of Note:

• VIA TWX: Viacom's Split Begins Its Test With Wall Street It's crunch time for Sumner Redstone. Mr. Redstone's bet that Viacom Inc., the media conglomerate he controls, will be worth more split into two companies is being put to the test today by Wall Street. While the split won't be formalized until year's end, shares in Viacom's offspring, one retaining the Viacom name and the other called CBS Corp., will start trading on a preliminary basis this morning. (Full Story) WSJ
• NOK MOT: New Phones from Motorola and Nokia Could be Stuffing Lots of Stockings JUST HEAR THOSE RING TONES jingling ring-ting-tingling. The holiday season is in full force, and Santa is busily outsourcing one of his more popular gifts: mobile phones. 'Tis the season for handset sales to snowball. As much as 20% of 2005's mobile-phone sales will take place during the final six weeks of the year, say wireless analysts Albert Lin and Rob Sanderson of American Technology Research, who recently surveyed phone sales. (Full Story) BARRONS
• BSX GDT: Boston Scientific Corp. said it is proposing to acquire all the outstanding shares of Guidant Corp. for a combination of cash and stock worth $72 for each Guidant share. Boston Scientific made the announcement in a statement distributed by PR Newswire. - Bloomberg
• Mad Money Summary: Jim Cramer was bullish on shares of Laureate Education (LAUR) due to its growth potential in the European and Latin American markets. Cramer said he is bullish on the shares as Laureate Education just bought Brazil's fifth largest University as well as the fact that the Latin American governments do not "harass Larueate" like the U.S. does to for-profit colleges. Cramer was also positive on shares of Seagate Technology (STX) and believes that the market has overlooked shares after the company raised guidance Thursday. Cramer also noted that Seagate is popular among private equity investors and that they could take the company private. Responding to a question, Cramer said he is not a fan of Komag (KOMG) or Hutchinson Technology (HTCH). Cramer was bullish on shares of Royal Bank of Canada (RY) due to the possibility that conservatives could win the January election there as all banks will benefit if the conservatives won. Cramer believes that the Royal Bank of Canada will benefit the most and that two unresolved issues would likely be resolved positively if the conservatives won that would allow Canadian banks to merge easier and a dividend tax credit. VeriSign's (VRSN) CEO Stratton Sclavos joined Cramer Friday on his show by telephone, Cramer believes that shares are "ready to roll...and thinks this stock goes higher."

Market Comments: The market is down a bit in early trading, on no real news. There was a negative SNDK piece in Barron's over the weekend. And BSX is making a competitive bid for GDT (vs. JNJ).

Oil is trading up above $60 due to a cold spell in the east, and bond yields are at 4.54%. Semis and homies are trading down the most, while energy stocks are bucking the trend and trading higher.

Monday mornings can be tough, in terms of getting back in the swing of things. But let's shake out the cobwebs and get to work.

long JNJ, TWX