News stories from Friday November 28, 1980

Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:

Who was in charge of the hostages in Iran remained a mystery. An Iranian official said he could not confirm reports that the Islamic militants occupying the American Embassy in Teheran had surrendered the captive Americans to the government. [New York Times] William Simon removed himself from consideration for any cabinet post in the administration of Ronald Reagan, the President-elect announced. Mr. Reagan also announced that George Shultz, who had been a leading candidate for Secretary of State, sent a message through a third party that he did not want to join the incoming administration. [New York Times] The largest of the fires in southern California that destroyed more than 180 homes and killed four persons was reported by firefighters to be 70 percent contained and was expected to be completely contained by tomorrow. Four other major brush fires were still burning east and north of Los Angeles and in San Diego County. [New York Times] A shutdown of Boston's transit system for the rest of the year starting next Friday was ordered by the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts. The court ruled that Gov. Edward King had acted illegally when he exercised his emergency powers and took over the system to avert a shutdown when it ran out of money. [New York Times] Many states are seeking alternatives to automobiles and trucks following the rapid rise in energy costs. Wisconsin is buying abandoned railroad lines and leasing them to new short-line operating companies. Ohio is planning an $8 billion high-speed train between its major cities, and California and Texas plan fast train lines based on Japanese and European models. [New York Times] Beatrice Foods was ordered to divest itself of Tropicana Products, the nation's largest citrus fruit processor, on the ground that its acquisition of Tropicana in 1978 had illegally restricted competition in the frozen orange juice business. The order came from an ad-ministrative law judge of the Federal Trade Commission, but is not final until issued by the full commission. He also took the highly unusual step of ordering Beatrice to give Tropicana's recent profits to the government. [New York Times] American military aid to El Salvador will be increased by the Reagan administration, according to the President-elect's advisers on Latin American affairs. They were said to have assured a group of businessmen from El Salvador that the military aid would include combat equipment for use against leftist guerrillas. [New York Times] The arms limitation treaty backed by the Carter administration is "dead as a doornail," Senator Charles Percy said at a news conference in Moscow. He said that he believed he had persuaded Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko that this was so. He said that he expected Washington and Moscow to start discussions "soon" on a new pact. [New York Times] The ouster of the Christian Democrats from Italy's government coalition was demanded by the Communist Party, which joined in the widespread criticism that the government was slow in sending aid to the earthquake area. Meanwhile, an official report said that 2,904 people were known to have died in the earthquake and that 1,564 others were missing. [New York Times] Poland was ready to deal with dissidents and it prepared a document for distribution to provincial prosecutors titled "Methods of Pursuing Participants in Illegal Anti-Socialist Activities." This was the document leaked from the general prosecutor's office that led to a strike call in Warsaw. With the release of the two men charged with leaking it, the strike threat diminished, but the controversy raised by the document will undoubtedly continue because it indicated a stepped-up drive against dissidents. [New York Times] Abadan was still under Iranian control, the Teheran radio said, contradicting Iraqi statements that the city had been cut off from the rest of Iran. The Teheran radio said that President Abolhassan Bani-Sadr visited Iranian troops in Abadan Thursday. [New York Times]

Stock Market Report

Dow Jones Industrial Average: 993.34 (+3.66, +0.37%)
S&P Composite: 140.52 (+0.35, +0.25%)
Arms Index: 0.81

	Issues	Volume*
Advances	709	15.61
Declines	793	14.17
Unchanged	415	4.46
Total Volume		34.24

* in millions of shares

Arms Index is the ratio of volume per declining issue to volume per advancing issue; a figure below 1.0 is bullish.

Market Index Trends
Date	DJIA	S&P	Volume*
November 26, 1980	989.68	140.17	55.34
November 25, 1980	982.68	139.33	55.83
November 24, 1980	978.75	138.31	51.13
November 21, 1980	989.93	139.11	55.93
November 20, 1980	1000.17	140.40	60.17
November 19, 1980	991.04	139.06	69.24
November 18, 1980	997.95	139.70	70.38
November 17, 1980	986.26	137.75	50.30
November 14, 1980	986.35	137.15	71.63
November 13, 1980	982.42	136.49	69.33