Before the bell: Futures sharply lower as oil rallies, dollar declines, GM takes a chargeAlmost any stock I've looked at so far has been down over 1% from Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL), Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN), Reearch in Motion (NASDAQ: RIMM) -- down about 1.2% as of 7:30 -- to Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C) -- down over 1.7% -- to Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) -- down over 1.8%. This gives another indication to the direction the market will be taking at the open. I expect stocks to be hammered.
Unlike GM's earnings, Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE: TM) reported that its quarterly profit rose 11% on solid overseas sales and it raised its earnings forecast for the full year.
Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) said it fired its chief information officer for violating company policies. No more details were provided. Meanwhile, today, the company said it signed an agreement with China's No. 2 personal computer maker to pre-install Microsoft's Windows operating system in PCs to combat widespread Chinese product piracy.
Delta Air Lines (NYSE: DAL) has reached a 10-year, $1 billion plus deal with Chromalloy Gas Turbine Corporation. The agreement will help the airline expand the types of engines it can maintain itself.
A group of Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives called Tuesday for a hearing to extend a public inquiry on Google Inc.'s (NASDAQ: GOOG) planned merger with DoubleClick.
Closing Bell: Economic Catapult for Thanksgiving & Black Friday (WMT, TGT, GRMN, GOOG, MSFT)
Deere up on Q4 earnings performance
Reid Hoffman: LinkedIn will go public (at some point)
