News stories from Friday January 13, 1978

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

Senator Hubert Humphrey, 66, died at his home at 10:25 P.M. The former Vice President died not more than two hours after David Gartner, Mr. Humphrey's administrative assistant, had announced that Mr. Humphrey had lapsed into a coma. Mr. Humphrey had been suffering from a pelvic cancer. [New York Times] Ending months of neutrality, Senator Robert Byrd, the majority leader, said he would strongly support ratification of the Panama Canal treaties, but with modifications to protect United States interests. His announcement came during the "January offensive" initiated by the administration to win support for the treaties. "This is not a passive endorsement," Mr. Byrd said. "It is not based on the fact that I am majority leader and my party is in power." [New York Times] The Dow Jones average hit another 33-month low, closing at 775.73, down 2.42 points. The stock market followed the dollar's fluctuation in foreign exchange markets, rising when the dollar rose and weakening when the dollar's rally faded in late afternoon. Except for a token advance Thursday, the Dow average has declined in every trading session of the new year, losing 55½ points since Jan. 3. [New York Times] Domestic car sales dropped 3.9 percent in 1978's first selling period from the results of a year ago, extending a decline that began in November. Detroit's major auto companies delivered 138,204 cars in the Jan. 1-10 period, compared with 143,771 in the same period last year. There were seven selling days in each period. [New York Times] Tongsun Park told United States investigators in Seoul that he gave $750,000 in covert gifts and political payments to American officials and political campaigns between 1970 and 1975, sources familiar with the testimony said. The payments, according to the sources, included $200,000 to former Representative Otto Passman, while he was in the House as a Louisiana Democrat, and $20,000 to President Nixon's 1972 re-election campaign. [New York Times] Westinghouse Electric's contract to build a $1.1 billion nuclear power plant already under way in the Philippines might be canceled by President Ferdinand Marcos. Mr. Marcos said he was considering the cancellation because Westinghouse had made payments to a friend who is an in-law of his. Westinghouse acknowledged having paid a commission to the friend, Herminio Dismi, a businessman, "for assistance in obtaining the contract and for implementation services." [New York Times] Arthur Burns, who was recently dismissed by President Carter as chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, resigned as one of the board's seven members to give his successor, G. William Miller, the "fullest opportunity to establish his leadership." [New York Times] Agreement was reached between Japan and the United States on a series of bilateral economic measures that, American officials said, would improve trade relations that have been strained by Japan's mounting trade surplus. Japan committed itself to "a marked diminution" in its current account surplus, "a sweeping review" toward liberalizing its foreign exchange controls, "substantially increased opportunities" for foreign suppliers seeking Japanese government contracts, increased Japanese foreign aid and specific review mechanisms that will monitor the trade agreement progress. [New York Times] United Artists' top three officers resigned simultaneously, culminating years of friction between the film distributor and its parent company, the Transamerica Corporation, which has owned U. A. since 1967. The officials are Arthur Krim, chairman; Eric Plescow, president and chief executive officer, and Robert Benjamin, chairman of the finance committee. They said they would remain in their posts until an agreement was reached on a departure date. [New York Times] The United States intends to propose that a compromise on the Palestinian issue be sought through an Israeli-Arab agreement on a temporary arrangement for the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The ultimate future of the Palestinians would be negotiated in later years.Israel's Defense Minister Ezer Weizman said that a general understanding had been reached with Egypt on the principle of dividing Sinai into three zones, but the details on how large the zones would be and where the lines would be drawn remained among the issues to be resolved. Mr. Weizman described the road to peace as "long, very long". Meanwhile, a recess was called for the Israeli-Egyptian talks in Cairo on military aspects of a Middle East settlement. [New York Times]

Stock Market Report

Dow Jones Industrial Average: 775.73 (-2.42, -0.31%)
S&P Composite: 89.69 (-0.13, -0.14%)
Arms Index: 1.23

	Issues	Volume*
Advances	751	7.40
Declines	606	7.36
Unchanged	488	3.25
Total Volume		18.01

* 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*
January 12, 1978	778.15	89.82	22.73
January 11, 1978	775.90	89.74	22.88
January 10, 1978	781.53	90.17	25.18
January 9, 1978	784.56	90.64	27.90
January 6, 1978	793.49	91.62	26.15
January 5, 1978	804.92	92.74	23.57
January 4, 1978	813.58	93.52	24.09
January 3, 1978	817.74	93.82	17.72
December 30, 1977	831.17	95.10	23.56
December 29, 1977	830.39	94.94	23.61