Business News: What You Missed Thanksgiving & Pre-Black Friday (AKH, GS, GLW, AMZN, NWS, MT, UAUA, URI, GOOG, CDTI)

Air France KLM SA (NYSE:AKH/ADR) shares traded up roughly 7% Thursday after beating earnings from price hikes and fuel hedging.

After United Rentals (NYSE:URI) said it was suing Cerberus on the broken merger, Cerberus is taking its own defensive actions to cap the damages to $100 million.

The O.E.C.D. puts total U.S. write-offs and write-downs at roughly $300 Billion from major U.S. banks, while so far only $50 Billion has been estimated out of major banks as to what may be written down…..Source, New York Times.

UAL Corp. (NASDAQ:UAUA) may be closer to a merger than they led on… source, Business Week.   Business Week also wonders if Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) ……and it talks up Clean Diesel Technologies (NASDAQ:CDTI)….

Bond insurer CIFG is being acquired for some $1.5 Billion by Groupe Banque Populaire and Groupe Caisse d’Epargne to take ownership from Natixis….. New York Times ran a story.

ArcelorMittal (NYSE:MT/ADR) confirmed media reports that it is in talks with controlling holders in China Oriental Group Limited on increasing its stake from 28%.

CNET and TechCrunch reported that News Corp. (NYSE:NWS) may acquire social networking site LinkedIn in early 2008.

Amazon.com’s (NASDAQ:AMZN) Kindle e-book reader priced at $399.00 is actually sold out already, with a new December 5, 2007 ‘in-stock’ date.

Financial Times reported that Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) is trying to raise $4 to $6 Billion for a new stock picking hedge fund… not quant, not computerized… old fashioned stock picking.

Corning (NYSE:GLW) may be one to watch as SAMSUNG is reportedly investing $2.2 Billion to increase its LCD production.

WSJ ASIA: China Railway raised 22.44 billion yuan from its Shanghai initial public offering, after pricing its shares at the top of the indicated price range.

Jon C. Ogg
November 23, 2007