CHO: Welcome back. "Minding Your Business" this morning. Can the Dow extend its three-day winning streak? U.S. stock futures are trading lower this morning. At the moment investors are not feeling so optimistic that Europe can solve its debt problems. In Brussels, the leaders of France and Germany are expected to urge all of E.U. members to adopt a new plan designed to prevent a repeat of Europe's debt crisis. Even so that debt crisis is far from resolved. Ratings agency Standard & Poor's placed 17 members of the euro currency zone on review for a possible downgrade. Germany and France are on the list. In about two hours from now we will get a fresh read on the employment situation. The initial jobless claims report is expected to show that 402,000 unemployment claims were filed for the first time last week. That's up slightly from last week. Any time that number is above 400,000, not a good sign for the labor market. Warren Buffett is making a big bet on the battered solar industry. The billionaire investor's energy company just agreed to buy $2 billion solar farm in California, one of the biggest solar projects in the world. America's solar industry has been struggling because of the lack of demand and massive oversupply. Drug maker Astrazeneca is cutting nearly a quarter of its U.S. work force that's more than 1,100 jobs. Layoffs are part of an objective to cut costs as cheaper generic drugs loomed for several of its key products. Yahoo has been awarded $610 million in damages from Tie, Nigerian scammers. Those groups reportedly sent more than 11.6 million e-mails telling people they won a lottery run by Yahoo. So Yahoo stands little chance of collecting. None of the defendants responded to Yahoo's complaints. AMERICAN MORNING will be back after this.
Warns Europe About Downgrade; Buffett Invests In Solar Energy; Astrazeneca To Cut 1150 U.S. Jobs