Morning Coffee Pre-Market Wall Street News

White House Wants To Slash Tax Breaks. As the fiscal cliff get closer reports say that the Obama Administration is proposing the elimination of $150 billion in tax breaks. As part of the negotiations to avert the fiscal cliff, tax breaks that would be eliminated include $28 billion for fossil fuel companies, $77 billion for inventory valuation, and $13 billion in capital-gains rates for P-E funds, VC firms, and real-estate transactions.

Upgrades

Halliburton (HAL): Macquarie raised their rating from Neutral to Outperform and placed a target price of $38.00 on the company. Pre-market: 31.00 +0.54 (1.77%)

Golar LNG Partners (GMLP): Citigroup raised their rating from Neutral to Buy and placed a target price of $33.50 on the company.

E*Trade Financial (ETFC): Evercore raised their rating from Underweight to Equal Weight. Pre-market: 7.94 +0.06 (0.71%)

Altria Group (MO): UBS raised their rating from Neutral to Buy and raised their target price from $35.00 to $36.00. Pre-market: 31.77 +0.53 (1.70%)

Bank of America (BAC): Stifel Nicolaus raised their rating from Hold to Buy and placed a target price of $11.00 on the company. Pre-market: 9.32 +0.20 (2.19%)

Downgrades

VF Corp (VFC): DA Davidson lowered their rating from Buy to Neutral and placed a target price of $169.00 on the company. Pre-market: 156.12 +0.30 (0.19%)

Earning Reports

Lowe's (LOW): Reported EPS of $0.40 beating estimates by +$0.05. Pre-market: 33.45 +1.47 (4.60%)

Tyson Foods (TSN): Reported EPS of $0.55 beating estimates by +$0.11. Pre-market: 17.45 +0.57 (3.38%)

Markets: 
Futures at 7:36: Dow +0.49%. S&P +0.63%. Nasdaq +0.70%. Crude +1.22% to $87.98. Gold +0.55% to $1724.00.

Europe: London +1.23%. Paris +1.55%. Frankfurt +0.32%. 

Asia: Japan +1.43% to 9153.2. Hong Kong +0.49% to 21262. China +0.11% to 2017. India +0.16% to 18339.