The Services Index is likely to show a more dramatic shift. Last months reading was 50.2, which shows ever so slight expansion since the reading was above 50.0. This month the reading is expected to dip down to 48.5, signaling contraction.

Factory orders for September are expected to show another drubbing. After posting a 4.0 percent drop in August, this report is expected to follow that up with another 1.5 percent drop in September. With GDP figures last week showing a smaller decline than expected, it may translate into a slightly better final number, although I would still expect to see a negative reading.  The Chicago Purchasing Managers Index showed a much steeper decline than expected and this could be an indication of what to expect from the factory orders report.

The Non-Farm Payrolls report is the dark cloud looming over the market this week. So far this year the economy has shed over 750,000 jobs, and in the final quarter of the year, it shows no signs of letting up. If the current pace continues, one million people will lose their jobs this year, a truly staggering number.

Earnings:
Tuesday: UBS
Wednesday: CSCO, TWX
Thursday: QCOM
Friday: F

Source: Employment Reports A Dark Cloud, Earnings Wind Down

This has had a negative effect on commodity prices. It has also brought considerable relief to consumers in the form of lower gas prices.

However, US exporters have watched their products become 10% more expensive in just two months.

Andrew Gordon says shorting US stocks with a heavy reliance on overseas sales is a great way to profit from US dollar strength. He lists the ten companies most vulnerable to further gains in the buck.

This from Investor’s Daily Edge:

There’s lots of ways to trade a strengthening dollar. One of the ways is to bet against the companies hurt by a dollar increasing in value.

Companies that rely on exports and overseas sales for a substantial portion of their total revenue would certainly qualify.

In a matter of a couple of months, their goods and services have become around 10 percent more expensive in overseas markets. Put another way, overseas customers are now paying a 10 percent premium on what they are now buying from U.S. companies.

It’s got to hurt sales and overseas sales revenue. And that is what some investors are counting on.

According to Bespoke Group, since mid-July, the 106 companies in the S&P 500 with more than 50 percent or their revenues coming from overseas markets have underperformed their benchmark index. Investors are selling and playing them short.

The ten with the highest international exposure are:

Philip Morris International (NYSE:PM) (100 percent exposure),

Newmont Mining (NYSE:NEM)(95 percent),

NVIDIA (NASDAQ:NVDA)(92 percent),

Advanced Micro Devices (NYSE:AMD) (88 percent),

Texas Instruments (NYSE:TXN) (87 percent),

Qualcomm (NASDAQ:QCOM) (87 percent),

Intel (NASDAQ:INTC) (84 percent),

Applied Materials (NASDAQ:AMAT) (84 percent),

AES Corp. (NYSE:AES) (81 percent),

Colgate Palmolive (NYSE:CL)(80 percent).

Just because their shares aren’t performing well right now doesn’t mean that all these companies will make smaller profits.But it does put pressure on margins, cash flow and the bottom line. In the above list, I still like Philip Morris. It’s done a good job of getting customers to trade up to its premium brands.

Source: The Curse of the Strong Dollar

Its shareholders already love the company’s new Co-CEO, Sanjay Jha. Just hours after the announcement, shares jumped 11%. Sanjay Jha, former COO of Qualcomm (NADAQ:QCOM) and engineering genius who is now in charge of the troubled mobile phone business, will be the head of the new handset company when Motorola splits in two in Q3 of 2009.

But will Jha be able to pull it off? Industry analysts are skeptical. While acknowledging that he excelled in operations at Qualcomm, they fear that Jha doesn’t have the marketing know-how to create exciting new products and pull Motorola out of the mud.

So should you buy Motorola (NYSE:MOT)? It’s hard to say until Mr. Jha makes a decision in 3 months as to how to turn Motorola around.

Another play that you may want to consider if you’re interested in tech, would be South Korea’s LG Electronics (PINK:LGERF). LG handsets, already popular worldwide are closing in on Motorola’s market share and are quickly gaining popularity in the U.S., which is Motorola’s backyard. LG is anticipated to have record sales this fall and this is not limited to their mobile devices. Their premium products are expected to continue their strong sales pattern despite global economic slow down.

Buying LG stock directly is a bit tricky though and the stock isn’t cheap, averaging over $100 a share. It’s available on the Korea Stock Exchange, the London Stock Exchange, and the Luxembourg Stock Exchange, and as a tiny ADR on the pinksheets.

You can also buy an exchange-traded fund such as iShares MSCI South Korea Index Fund (NYSE:EWY), which includes LG Electronics.

Source: Has Motorola Seen The Worst?

• Southwest Airlines Co. (LUV) yesterday (Thursday) announced that second-quarter revenue increased 15% due to the advance purchase of fuel contracts, Bloomberg News reported. Second quarter earnings increased to $321 million or 44 cents per share for the Dallas-based air carrier. Even without the boost from fuel hedging, Southwest would have earned $121 million or 16 cents per share, beating analyst expectations.

• The national minimum wage in the United States increased yesterday (Thursday) by 70 cents, bringing the federally mandated hourly rate to $6.55. This is the second increase in a three-stage plan to eventually boost the rate to $7.25 per hour under the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007, CNNMoney reported.

• Mobile phone manufacturers Qualcomm Inc. (QCOM) and Nokia Corp. (ADR: NOK) struck a deal to end a long-running patent dispute over wireless technology causing both stocks to gain in trading yesterday (Thursday). Under the terms of the agreement, Qualcomm extended a 15-year license to Nokia to utilize its patents for use in Nokia mobile devices and wireless-networking equipment, MarketWatch reported.

• Potash Corp. of Saskatchewan Inc. (POT) announced yesterday (Thursday) that second-quarter profits jumped threefold to $905.1 million, or $2.82 a share, from $285.7 million, or 88 cents a share for the same period the year prior. The fertilizer company attributed the gains to strong global demand for potash, nitrogen and phosphate products, MarketWatch reported.

• The number of people filing claims for unemployment benefits soared over 400,000 last week as companies trimmed their work forces to cope with a slowing economy. The Labor Department reported yesterday (Thursday) that the number of new applications filed for these benefits rose by a seasonally adjusted 34,000 to 406,000 for the week ending July 19.

• Ford Motor Co. (F) posted the worst quarterly performance in its history yesterday (Thursday), with a second-quarter loss of $8.67 billion. The net loss included $8.03 billion worth of write-offs because the sharp decline in U.S. truck and SUV sales has reduced the value of Ford’s North American truck plants and Ford Motor Credit Co.’s lease portfolio.

• The Dow Chemical Co. (DOW) said yesterday (Thursday) that despite record sales and two double-digit price increases, second-quarter profit fell 27%, due to higher costs for energy and raw materials. The world’s second-largest chemical company said its net income for the three-month period ended June 30 was $762 million, or 81 cents per share, compared with $1.04 billion, or $1.07 per share, in the same period last year. Revenue rose 23% to a company record $16.38 billion, MarketWatch reported.

• Macau’s casino revenues jumped 48% in the second quarter, as its 30 casinos brought in $3.6 billion in the three months ended in June, compared with $2.4 billion last year. Higher VIP baccarat revenues, up more than 52% to $2.5 billion compared with a year ago, were the biggest factor, the Associated Press reported.

Source: Global Investing Roundups: Friday, July 25th, 2008

• Myron Ullman, the chief executive officer of department store company J.C. Penney Co. Inc. (JCP), said that he doesn’t intend to provide annual financial guidance at this time, as the market is too cloudy to predict a forecast, Reuters reported. “I’ve been in the business 39 years. I don’t think I’ve ever seen an environment that was as unpredictable as the current environment,” he said.

• Wells Fargo & Co. (WFC) emerged from the first quarter with analyst-beating results, posting an 11% decline in profits but a 12% increase in revenue and 1% decline in expenses. “Despite a weakening economy, the continued downturn in housing and expected higher charge-offs, this was a remarkably strong quarter,” Chief Executive John Stumpf said in a statement.

• China’s economy grew by 10.6% in the first quarter of 2008, only slightly less than the 11.2% expansion in the final three months of 2007. The country was able to maintain double-digit growth despite complications stemming from the U.S. credit crunch, the Chinese New Year and the worst ice storm the country had seen in decades.

• General Electric Co. (GE) plans to invest up to $2 billion in acquisitions and other deals in China over the next three years as part of a strategy to double its revenues in the country, the Financial Times reported. The world’s biggest industrial company, which stunned investors last week when it announced its worst quarter in five years, is looking to hire a team of 20 “in-house investment bankers” to conduct the deals in China.

• Toyota Kirloskar Motor Private Ltd., the automotive joint venture between Japan’s Toyota Motor Corp. (TM) and India’s Kirloskar Group is set to invest $350 million on a new plant in Bangalore. The plant will follow Tata Motor Corp’s (TTM) lead by producing “a strategic new small car” by 2010, IBTimes India reported.

• Qualcomm Inc. (QCOM) announced it would invest in India-based start-up technology companies that offer “innovative technologies and services that enhance wireless communications and semiconductor ecosystems,” The Financial Express reported. San Diego-based Qualcomm’s first investment will be in India’s Tessolve Services Pvt. Ltd., a firm that provides solutions and platforms for semiconductor testing, packaging, qualification and failure analysis.

• The U.S. Department of Justice has approved the $810 million deal that allows Russia’s largest steel producer Severstal OAO to purchase the Sparrows Point steel mill from ArcelorMittal (MT). The DOJ demanded the sale of the Baltimore County, Md.-based plant after the merger between India-based Mittal and Luxemburg-based Arcelor to enforce anti-monopoly laws.

• General Electric Co. (GE) former chief executive Jack Welch demonstrated his frustration yesterday (Wednesday) with his successor, Jeffrey Immelt, after GE’s profit fell 6% in the first quarter. “I’d be shocked beyond belief and I’d get a gun out and shoot him if he doesn’t make what he promised now,” Welch said in a CNBC interview, a cable station owned by GE, The Associated Press reported. “Just deliver the earnings. Tell them you’re going to grow 12% and deliver 12%.”

According to the report, “Mobile TV in India: Understanding the Mobile Entertainment Needs of Indian Users,” mobile TV could achieve a penetration rate of 5% to 6% of the total mobile-communications subscriber base in India this year. This is the first year that mobile TV services are being offered, says Springboard, a top provider of advisory services on new and innovative information-technology products and services.

“The market is ripe for the launch of mobile TV services and we believe that India will have around 12 million mobile TV subscribers within the first year of launch of service,” Ravi Shekhar Pandey, Springboard’s manager of syndicated research, said in an interview with the International Business Times. “Mobile telephone operators will have an advantage over standalone mobile TV operators in that the former already have users subscribing to their value-added services. However, the success of either operator will be dependent on content offered and price charged for the service.”

Subscription-based mobile TV is available in the United States, through such services as the V-Cast Mobile TV service offered by the Verizon Wireless unit of Verizon Inc. (VZ), or the MobiTV service offered by Cingular Wireless, now a unit of AT&T Inc. (T). However, those two services are each unique to their respective carriers, since the two companies employ different wireless technology standards. The Cingular service debuted in 2006, while V-Cast first became available in 2007.

When it comes to tech-based products and services aimed at the consumer market, Asian countries tend to be the world’s “early adopters” – with such wares appearing in markets like Japan, Korea or India months or even years before similar offerings appear for sale in the U.S. market.

Japan is typically the best example of this trend. Take global-positioning systems. Consumers and cab-drivers were adding portable GPS units into their cars as early as the middle 1990s; those same products didn’t really make a splash in the U.S. market until the early part of this decade, and it’s only been in the past couple of years where the prices have dropped to the point where they’re becoming a ubiquitous add-on, or where automakers are offering them as an option on new model cars and trucks.

Indeed, among the many things that the Japanese metropolis of Tokyo is known for is the “Akihabara Electric Town,” a massive gadgets bazaar that’s a 10-minute train trip from the downtown. A bustling, overcrowded community before World War II, the area was wiped away by a fire and kept clear – eventually evolving into what many believe is now the largest concentration of electronics vendors anywhere on earth.

One of the town’s early claims to fame was for being the home to one of the first stores devoted to personal robots and robotics. Western tourists who visit Japan invariably visit Akihabara, and are typically stunned to find electronic products that aren’t available in their home market – and that don’t actually show up there for months or years.

India’s mobile-TV services are yet another example of an innovative, tech-based service that many American consumers have never even heard of.

In India, public-service broadcaster Doordarshan is the only company currently offering limited mobile TV service. Nokia Corp. (NOK), Spice Communication’s Spice Telecom unit, U.S.-based Qualcomm Inc. (QCOM) and South Korea’s Samsung are few of the stakeholders actively promoting the adoption of mobile TV in India.

In its report, market-researcher Springboard recommends that mobile-service providers should offer an “on-demand” pay-per-view option that does not bind users to a monthly subscription for mobile TV. Springboard also concludes that a close collaboration between mobile operators and broadcasters will create a profitable business model for mobile TV service in India.

That model makes sense, since “mobile TV marries the two dominant consumption trends of entertainment and mobile telephony in India,” said Pandey, the Springboard Research manager.

In the U.S. and European markets, mobile TV has so far been a “mixed bag,” according to a new study. The business potential is very large – an estimated $270 million in the next 12 months – but only if carriers can improve the quality of their offerings and the reliability of their service, both of which have been less than satisfactory.

The so-called “M: Metrics Study,” commissioned by networking leader Tellabs Inc. (TLAB) – and released at the “Mobile World Congress” in Barcelona back in mid-February – found that the mobile TV market grew at an impressive 36% in 2007. However, the population of “former” mobile TV subscribers – those who cancelled out of dissatisfaction or other reasons – grew at nearly double that rate (68%).

However, the study also found that 60% of the former subscribers say that they would pay to watch mobile TV again if service quality and reliability significantly improved in the coming year. And by regaining just half the potential market lost due to those quality and reliability issues, mobile operators would achieve the $270 million revenue target, the study concluded.

At the Mobile World Congress, carriers were looking at market opportunities, crucial at a time when such things as airtime have become little more than a commodity service whose success or failure turns largely on service quality and price.

“Users decide which new services succeed, not the industry,” said Tellabs Vice President Pat Dolan. “It’s challenging for operators to make a living as mere pipe vendors. By offering mobile content users enjoy, operators can increase revenue. Yet this necessitates network enhancements, as acceptance of high-bandwidth services depends on the quality, reliability and capacity of the mobile backhaul. Tellabs is working with many operators in addressing these issues, and we are confident the industry will progress further.”

According to Tellabs, the research that it commissioned on Mobile TV users’ attitudes was conducted in the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, France, Spain and, for the first time, the United States.