Liquidnet Holdings Inc, which got is start in the dot-com heyday of the late 1990s, has filed to go public.

Essentially, Liquidnet facilitates large equity trades for institutional investors - which are anonymous. In fact, the platform allows access to about 7.5 billion shares per day of liquidity.

No doubt, the company is putting pressure on the traditional exchanges and yes, is growing at a rapid clip. From 2005 to 2007, revenues spiked from $161.8 million to $346.5 million. Net income was a juicy $191.2 million last year. To keep up the growth, Liquidnet wants to expand aggressively into foreign markets, where things are still in the early stages.

The lead underwriters on the IPO include Goldman, Sachs & Co. (NYSE: GS) and Credit Suisse (NYSE: CS). Moreover, you can find the prospectus at the SEC website.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He also operates MergerBook.com.

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In the first half of 2008, the S&P 500 fell 12%. June's stock market was the worst since 1930. So are stocks now a screaming buy or are they poised to plunge further? Nobody knows. But my guess is that stocks will move based on how well they perform compared with expectations. And the risk of negative surprises in most industries exceeds the chance of positive ones. So stocks will probably keep falling.

Here's a quick review of six negatives:

• Oil prices. With oil at $142, up 492% since January 2001, consumers are paying about $4.10 a gallon for gas and companies that use oil are getting squeezed while trying to raise prices. An attack on Iran, a big oil supplier, looms on the horizon. This and other geopolitical uncertainties could put further pressure on oil.
• Housing. Three million people are expected to face foreclosure on their homes. And prices have dropped 15%. Since people were using home equity to finance their purchasing, their negative equity is sucking the wind out of the economy.

• Tight credit. Banks are facing huge write-offs thanks to their $500 billion in Level 3 assets -- those that have no active market. And they are struggling to raise capital at a time when they are in particularly deep trouble. In light of that, banks are freezing consumers' home equity lines of credit and otherwise making it difficult for them to get access to debt.
• Unemployment. The New York Times reports that Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) expects the unemployment rate to hit 6.4% in late 2009, up from the current 5.5%. Workers who aren't working tend to cut back on spending and they can't easily get access to credit.
• Stagnant incomes. The median income has fallen from $61,000 in 2000 to $60,500 in 2007. With flat incomes, consumers can't make up for higher prices by borrowing so they are cutting back on everything that does not involve paying for gasoline, feeding their family, and heating or cooling their homes.
• Corporate earnings down. As I posted, earnings at S&P 500 companies are expected to be down 11% for the second period, led by a 60% plunge in financial-sector earnings. Those estimates fell during the quarter. On April 1, analysts expected a 2% drop in S&P earnings and a 31% decline in the financial sector.

Some stocks will go up, but now is not the time to catch a falling knife.

Peter Cohan is President of Peter S. Cohan & Associates. He also teaches management at Babson College and edits The Cohan Letter.

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Six months of 2008 are now behind us and the stock market has not been a friendly place to most investors. Stability that was once found in household names that were industry giants is gone, and they have now been brought to their knees.

Many of them were the stocks we might have looked to in the past for stability, so you can be sure I put forward my five candidates with a little trepidation, but forward I go anyway. First a little review is in order.

Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C) dropped from around $53 per share last year to around $30 in January and we can buy it today for around $17. Even at that price Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) has downgraded it to a sell and thinks there is more bad news to come. Citigroup was the largest bank in the world. Not any more.

General Motors (NYSE: GM) was the largest car maker in the world. That was before the stock tumbled from $43 to its current $11 range. A crushing blow to long time investors hoping that someone in the company could stop the ship from sinking.

Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) itself is down from $250 to a very soft $177 (it's traded as low as $161.21 today) and does not appear to be at risk as much as some of its competitors, companies that do not look as competitive any more. Bear Stearns is gone, Lehman Brothers Holdings (NYSE: LEH) is on the ropes and Merrill Lynch (NYSE: MER) and Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) are teetering.

Reliable software giant Microsoft Inc. (NASDAQ: MSFT) is down from $37.50 to $27 and is so desperate for some traction that it is wasting its time with something called the Zune and made an unsuccessful offer to acquire Yahoo! (NASDAQ: YHOO), which is also down on its luck; 50% down since it rejected the offer.

I do not own any of these stocks, and I could list a thousand stocks to keep them company. Some that I do own as "core holdings" that are down include Huaneng Power Intl ADS (NYSE: HNP) that was trading as high as $57 and is now a more affordable $27 per share. Another one of my favorites, Intuitive Surgical Inc (NASDAQ: ISRG), is down from $360 to $260 and may drop further as hospitals look to conserve capital the rest of the year and into the uncertainty of a new presidential administration and economy. Even that old standby for tough times Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.B) has shown weakness dropping 20% from around $5,000 to $4,000 a share.

I could point to some energy and food stocks that have done well this year but those could lose their footing as well if oil prices do not hold up. There are those that think we are in a short term speculative bubble and they could give back some of the this year's gains.

So where to hide? What if anything has been stable? The following five companies made the grade.

1) Johnson and Johnson (NYSE: JNJ): This one is probably not any surprise. There was no money to be made here but you would not have lost any either. Year to date it has traded between $68 and $64 and that is about where it has been for quite some time. It does pay almost a 3% dividend yield and that's mighty fine these days.

2) Teva Pharmaceuticals ADR (NASDAQ: TEVA): Pharmaceuticals have long been a safe haven in troubled times and the world's largest maker of generic drugs is sitting pretty these days with expanding markets everywhere it looks. This Israeli company has traded roughly between $43 and $47 for quite some time, pays a 1% yield and looks to have plenty of upside going forward.

3) Chubb Corp (NYSE: CB) the conservative insurance company has held up better than most of its peers. Over the past six months and going back two years it has hovered between $49 and $54, all the time paying about a 2.6% yield.

4) Xcel Energy (NYSE: XEL) is a holding company for numerous utilities. Over the course of the past twelve volatile months it has been trading in a 10% range between $20 and $22 while paying a huge yield, which today stands at 4.8%.

5) Walt Disney (NYSE: DIS) may be a great place to hide if you want to forget your troubles, whether you chose the new Pixar hit movie "WALL-E" or Disneyland, or a trip down memory lane renting or downloading any one of its countless hits from its film library. The stock is currently trading in the neighborhood of $30.62, mid-point in its 52 week range. Over the past six months it has spent most of the time drifting between $30 and $33 per share with a few drops and pops here and there. The 1.1% yield is not as generous as the others but it I would be happy to take it.

What do they have in common? They are diversified among their industries, have growth horizons, and of course they all pay dividends. But the standout at this juncture seems to be that they all have shrewd conservative management teams -- and they have been in the right place, at the right time, and prepared.

Sheldon Liber is the CEO of a small private investment company and the principal for design and research at an architecture & planning firm. He writes the columns Chasing Value and Serious Money. DISCLOSURE: I currently own shares of BRK.B, HNP, ISRG, JNJ.

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Like many other financial institutions, investors are worried about the viability of CIT Group Inc. (NYSE: CIT), which is a major business lender. Of course, the stock price has plunged - and there are many rumors swirling.

But today, there was some good news. That is, CIT has struck $1.8 billion in deals to unload its manufactured housing/home loan units. The stock is up 16% to $7.93.

There were actually two buyers. First, private equity firm Lone Star Funds agreed to a $1.5 billion transaction for the home lending division. Next, Vanderbilt Mortgage and Finance will spend $300 million for the manufactured home segment.

These deals are certainly a big relief. Basically, CIT can now focus on its core business - and not deal with the headaches of the consumer area.

Actually, CIT has some big-time backing. For example, Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) recently made a $3 billion infusion.

Yet, there are still many challenges. After all, CIT has had difficulties generating profits and the credit crunch isn't going away.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He also operates MergerBook.com.

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Sheldon Liber is the CEO of a small private investment company and the principal for design and research at an architecture & planning firm. He writes the columns Chasing Value and Serious Money. Disclosure: I own shares of GD.

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GM is trading at a 30 year low. "Today's drop came after a Goldman Sachs analyst cut his rating for GM to "Sell" from "Neutral" and his price target to $11 from $16, saying things could still get worse for the North American automotive industry as a whole."

I wonder if he read my post yesterday . . . probably not. I am not a big fan of analysts as a group but this did not take a crystal ball. Barron's should do a follow-up story explaining how their crystal ball got so fogged up.

Not to pick on GM, Barron's or analysts, but this happens to all investors and prognosticators. My real concern about the articles I read is that everyone has way too many ifs, ands or buts in their analyses to draw definite conclusions. This is a recurring theme in my rants as I try to get folks to realize that it is very hard to determine the answer to an equation when there are a few known elements and a multitude of variables.

I think someone less long winded than I simply said, "yeah, when elephants can fly!"

UPDATE: The closing stock price was $11.43.

Sheldon Liber is the CEO of a small private investment company and the principal for design and research at an architecture & planning firm. He writes the columns Chasing Value and Serious Money.

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MOST NOTEWORTHY:

• Goldman downgraded U.S. Brokers to Neutral from Attractive since they can not find a catalyst to move the group significantly higher over the next few months given the continued deterioration in fundamentals. Goldman added Citigroup (NYSE:C) to their Conviction Sell List as they expect additional write-downs of $8.9B in Q2 and see the potential for additional capital raises. Goldman lowered their target price on Citigroup shares to $16 and recommends a pair trade of long Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS), short Citigroup.
  
• Wachovia downgraded Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) shares to Market Perform from Outperform on renewed economic fears, a likely slower pace of substantial capital raises, seasonally slower prime brokerage, and valuation.
  
• Research in Motion (NASDAQ:RIMM) was cut to Market Perform from Outperform at JMP Securities following the weaker-than-expected Q1 report and guidance and lowered FY09 EPS estimates on increased spending.

• Red Hat (NYSE:RHT) was downgraded to Market Weight from Overweight at Thomas Weisel.
  
• JP Morgan lowered British Sky Broadcasting (NYSE:BSY) to Underweight from Overweight.
  
• WuXi Pharma (NYSE:WX) was downgraded at Oppenheimer to Perform from Outperform.
  
• General Motors (NYSE:GM) was downgraded at Goldman to Sell from Neutral.

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MAJOR PAPERS:

• The stock is up 150% over the last year but with its move into the consumer marker BlackBerry maker Research in Motion Limited (NASDAQ: RIMM) is entering the fickle world of consumer trendiness, reported the Wall Street Journal's "Heard on the Street". Analysts are concerned about how big the consumer market can be for them, and then there's Apple Inc (NASDAQ: AAPL) and Nokia Corporation (NYSE: NOK) beating down the consumer path. Smart products will help, but price is an issue, and the shares could face a hard fall.
• The Wall Street Journal reported that Wachovia Corporation (NYSE: WB) acknowledged it has hired The Goldman Sachs Group Inc (NYSE: GS) to study its troubled portfolios of mortgages, a move which many believe indicates the bank is gauging the market value of the loans in order to eventually sell them.

• Lazard Ltd (NYSE: LAZ) was hired by UBS AG (NYSE: UBS) to undertake a strategic review of the Swiss bank's businesses, the New York Post learned.
• The New York Post also reported some reported turmoil at Live Nation Inc (NYSE: LYV), following the abrupt departure of the concert promoter's chairman, Michael Cohl. Employees in the unit that was led by Cohl fear that the company will lay some of them off, and CEO Michael Rapino is accused of not being strongly committed to the company's mega-deal strategy.
• The Boston Herald reported that its unions were told the newspaper will lay off 130 to 160 workers, under its new plan to outsource printing operations elsewhere in the state.

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From TheStreet.com Network

• Tech Winners & Losers: Motorola
  
• Analysts' Upgrades, Downgrades: Motorola

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MAJOR PAPERS:

• The Wall Street Journal's "The Game" column speculates that one of the results of the Bear Stearns crash could be the push of investment banks and commercial ones closer together, which could result in better handling of volatility with more stability. Some observers think Merrill Lynch & Co (NYSE: MER), Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) or The Goldman Sachs Group Inc (NYSE: GS) could go that route by buying a commercial bank. Any move would force them to adhere to better reserve ratios, affect short term bank funding, and shrink balance sheets.
• The Wall Street Journal reported that Google Inc (NASDAQ: GOOG) will soon make available a new service that measure hits on the Internet with the intent of helping advertisers decide where to buy ads online and would directly compete with comScore Inc (NASDAQ: SCOR) and Nielsen Online. Ad executives said Google's method could make targeting markets more efficient.
• A Manhattan judge dismissed four claims made by American International Group Inc (NYSE: AIG) in its fight to regain control of a block of its shares held by Starr International, a company that once founded a lucrative compensation plan for AIG executives. AIG believes the shares held by Starr should continue to be used to fund employee compensation, the Financial Times reported.

• According to Scorpio Partnership, Bloomberg reported that UBS AG (NYSE: UBS) and Merrill Lynch had slower growth in assets under management last year due to losses connected to the U.S. subprime crisis.

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Two separate pieces of news hit the market. They did not appear to be directly related, but they do say that employment on Wall Street could drop much further this year.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Citigroup's (NYSE: C) "will dismiss thousands of investment-banking employees world-wide as part of a plan to cut the roughly 65,000-employee group by 10%." The FT reports, Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) "is now expected to cut up to 10 per cent of staff in the division that handles mergers and acquisition advice and corporate fundraisings."

Because Goldman is perceived as doing relative well in a tough financial environment, the news is particularly bad.

The information is another sign that the world of Wall Street is not turning around. If these companies saw a second half recovery, they might be less likely to cut so deeply.

But, it is part of a trend. After bottoming in March, U.S. financial stocks started to move back up at the end of Spring. There was talk that the credit crisis had seen its peak.

With new write-offs and thousand of people in the industry about to be out of work, it looks like the April rally was for suckers.

Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at 247wallst.com.

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MAJOR PAPERS:

• Last November, Google Inc (NASDAQ: GOOG) and 30 partners were said be developing a new type of handset using Android that was expected to revolutionize the industry. The first new phones were expected to be available in this year's second half but are now slated for the fourth quarter the Wall Street Journal reported.
• According to people familiar with the situation, the Wall Street Journal reported that Citigroup Incorporated (NYSE: C) will make sharp cuts in its investment banking division this week.
• The Wall Street Journal reported that Live Nation Inc's (NYSE: LYV) Chairman, Michael Cohl, stepped down down as a director and executive to end the strategy feud with CEO Michael Rapino. over how to pursue the "360 deals" with music superstars.
• The Financial Times reported that there are worries that investment banks will accelerate the pace of their layoffs this summer, after it became known that The Goldman Sachs Group Inc (NYSE: GS) gave pink slips to workers in its investment banking division last week. Goldman is now expected to lay off up to 10% of the workers at the division.

• New Jersey put its $150M center for stem cell research on hold, the Star Ledger reported, eight months after ground was broken on the project.

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Here are some highlights from this past week's earnings coverage from BloggingStocks:

• Best Buy Inc. (NYSE: BBY) beat Q1 estimates as consumers spent their government stimulus checks.
• Carnival Corp. (NYSE: CCL) posted better than-expected Q2 results but offered cautious Q3 guidance.
• Cyberonics Inc. (NASDAQ: CYBX) beat Q4 expectations and offered full-year guidance.
• FactSet Research Systems (NYSE: FDS) had better-than-expected Q3 results and 500 new subscribers.
• General Mills Inc. (NYSE: GIS) raised its full-year guidance, sending shares up near the 52-week high.
• Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (NYSE: GS) results beat the previous quarter and analysts' estimates.
• John Wiley & Sons Inc. (NYSE: JW.A) doubled its Q4 earnings due to an acquisition.
• Life Partners Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ: LPHI) lifted its Q1 outlook after "best quarter" in company history.
• Lindsay Corp. (NYSE: LNN) Q3 profits nearly doubled, but the share price plunged anyway.
• Meade Instruments Corp. (NASDAQ: MEAD) narrowed its full-year net loss due to restructuring.
• Pall Corp. (NYSE: PLL) beat Q1 expectations on sales growth that was broadly based across markets.
• Titan Machinery Inc. (NASDAQ: TITN) beat Q1 estimates on strong demand for agricultural equipment.
• Vermont Pure Holdings Ltd. (AMEX: VPS) posted strong Q2 results despite a bad debt write-off.
• Western Union Co. (NYSE: WU) said 2008 profits would beat estimates and announced share buyback.

More earnings highlights from this week: Morgan Stanley, FedEx, Ford, GE, Circuit City and others

Also, BusinessWeek likes the earnings prospects for agricultural stocks such as Archer Daniels Midland (NYSE: ADM), Monsanto (NYSE: MON), and Deere & Co. (NYSE: DE).

Upcoming results to watch for include Walgreen (NYSE: WAG), Kroger (NYSE: KR), Bed Bath & Beyond (NASDAQ: BBBY), General Mills (NYSE: GIS), Monsanto (NYSE: MON), Nike (NYSE: NKE), Oracle (NASDAQ: ORCL), Research in Motion (NASDAQ: RIMM), ConAgra (NYSE: CAG), Discover (NYSE: DFS), McCormick (NYSE: MKC), Rite Aid (NYSE: RAD:), and KB Home (NYSE: KBH).

Visit AOL Money & Finance for more earnings coverage.

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Minyanville's Sean Udall dares to share the kind of keen insight and actionable information you won't find in any prospectus. For more original thought, visit

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Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS), the nation's second largest investment bank,