PRESS DIGEST - Wall Street Journal - Feb 9

Feb 9 (Reuters) - The following were the top stories in
The Wall Street Journal on Monday. Reuters has not verified
these stories and does not vouch for their accuracy.
* General Motors Corp is in talks to take back
large portions of Delphi Corp , the parts supplier
spun off by the auto maker a decade ago. The move is part of a
strategy to qualify for additional government loans.
* Sirius XM Radio Inc received, and rebuffed, an
offer late last year by satellite mogul Charles Ergen to take
control of the cash-strapped company. Ergen proposed for one
of his satellite companies, EchoStar Corp or Dish
Network Corp , to inject enough capital into Sirius
for it to meet its debt obligations and avoid a bankruptcy
filing.
* Saks Inc's decision to cut prices by 70 percent
on designer clothes in mid-November has set off a domino
effect in the luxury goods business.
* Senate Democrats are confident they can push for a final
vote on a revamped $827 billion economic stimulus package
early this week.
* U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner is considering
a plan to help purge banks of their bad bets by partnering
with the private sector to buy troubled assets.
* Hoping to jump-start the financial system, the Obama
administration is considering turning to a new program run by
the Federal Reserve that has been a challenge to launch and
depends heavily on hedge funds.
* William Ackman, the hedge-fund manager known for
criticizing insurers and other companies over their
performance, scrambled over the weekend to ease investor ire
stemming from losses of his own.
* Struggling to salvage a soured debt investment, Fillmore
Capital Partners LLC, a San Francisco hedge fund, is in talks
to take control of two distressed New York office buildings
connected to New York City developer Harry Macklowe.
* Former federal prosecutor Robert Khuzami will be named
the new head of enforcement at the U.S. Securities and
Exchange Commission as soon as this week, in the latest bid by
the SEC's new chief to restore its credibility.
* Starbucks Corp , which built a coffee empire on
its premium image, wants to convince customers that its drinks
aren't that expensive. The company plans to announce that it
is selling discounted pairings of coffee and breakfast food
for $3.95, a type of promotion long used at fast-food chains.
* Microsoft Corp is planning a series of new
programs and services for mobile phones, responding to stiff
competition from Apple Inc and other rivals. The
offerings will include an online bazaar for distributing
software to cellular phones that run Microsoft's Windows
Mobile operating system
* The boards of Live Nation Inc and Ticketmaster
Entertainment Inc were close to approving an
all-stock deal to combine the two companies Sunday night in a
move that would change the music industry. Negotiations were
unfinished late Sunday night, however.
* Walt Disney Co is expected to announce a movie
distribution agreement with Steven Spielberg's DreamWorks SKG,
three days after General Electric Co's Universal
Pictures pulled out of a similar deal with DreamWorks.
* In Hong Kong, masters of feng shui routinely weigh in on
money matters. And after a year of huge financial losses,
they're finding an especially receptive audience.
((Compiled by Tenzin Pema; Bangalore Equities Newsdesk +91 80
4135 5800; within U.S. +1 646 223 8780))

Keywords: PRESS DIGEST/WSJ

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