News stories from Friday June 15, 1979

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

Oil refineries are operating at the fullest capacity possible, under available supplies of crude oil, the oil industry insisted in responding to Energy Secretary James Schlesinger's contention that they might be holding back production of gasoline and other petroleum products.The oil industry was warned by the administration that it was considering measures to take crude oil from companies that are not refining as much gasoline as they can and to give it to companies "prepared to use it." [New York Times] An effort to aid independent truckers was made by the Interstate Commerce Commission, which ordered trucking companies to pay a surcharge of 5.6 percent to owner-operators who work for them to help offset high diesel fuel prices. But the chief of the truckers group spurned the offer. [New York Times] Open service stations were besieged by long lines of cars as an increasing number of stations were closed in the New York metropolitan area. Government officials sought ways to ease the problem, which caused traffic tie-ups and rising anger among motorists, exploding in a gunfight among "gypsy" cab drivers at one station and the ripping out of a pump at another. [New York Times] Passengers holding half-fare coupons are jamming flights out of Washington, Boston, New York and Philadelphia on United and American Airlines this weekend. The carriers have offered the coupons for use from July 1 to Dec. 15 on all their domestic flights, and American's runs to the Virgin Islands, Neither airline is accepting reservations for short flights anywhere. United said that it had given out four million coupons. The coupon offer ends Sunday night. [New York Times] The Progressive magazine failed in its court fight to vacate a preliminary injunction that prevented it from running an article about the hydrogen bomb. The motion was denied in Milwaukee by Federal District Court Judge Robert Warren, who took the unusual action of having his written opinion, explaining the reasons for his decision, sealed from the public. [New York Times] The first major breakthrough in two months of contract negotiations with major tire manufacturers was made as the United Rubber Workers Union and the B.F. Goodrich Company reached a tentative agreement on a three-year pact. The agreement reportedly exceeds President Carter's wage and price guidelines. [New York Times] A high Soviet delegation gathered in Vienna for a series of meetings with President Carter. Leonid Brezhnev led the group, which included Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko, Defense Minister Dmitri Ustinov, and Konstantin Chernenko, Mr. Brezhnev's close personal aide. It was the highest-ranking Soviet delegation assembled for any recent East-West meeting. [New York Times] Malaysian troops will shoot on sight Vietnamese refugees seeking to come ashore, and the 76,000 refugees in camps along the Malaysian coast will be shipped out to sea, a government announcement said. Malaysia had recently said that it would take harsh measures to halt the influx of refugees, but it was not clear whether the "shoot on sight" announcement was an actual policy or a tactic to try to get help with the refugee problem. [New York Times] The likelihood of repeal of the economic sanctions against Zimbabwe Rhodesia was lessened by a measure unanimously approved by the House Foreign Affairs Committee that would enable President Carter to maintain them if he determined that it was in the national interest. The 26 to 0 vote also indicated that the House would not agree, as the Senate did this week, to lift the trade ban immediately. [New York Times] A draft constitution based on Islamic law has been submitted to Ayatollah Khomeini, Iran's government announced. About 90 percent of the draft was published by an Iranian newspaper. [New York Times] A battle erupted outside the American Embassy in Managua when Nicaraguan National Guardsmen stationed on the embassy grounds fired on what they said were rebels in adjoining fields. Meanwhile, guerrillas crossed into Nicaragua from Costa Rica to help the Sandinist National Liberation Front's fight, according to Nicaragua's Foreign Minister. [New York Times]

Stock Market Report

Dow Jones Industrial Average: 843.30 (+0.96, +0.11%)
S&P Composite: 102.09 (-0.11, -0.11%)
Arms Index: 0.85

	Issues	Volume*
Advances	765	16.24
Declines	657	11.87
Unchanged	452	12.63
Total Volume		40.74

* 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*
June 14, 1979	842.34	102.20	37.84
June 13, 1979	842.17	102.31	40.75
June 12, 1979	845.29	102.85	45.44
June 11, 1979	837.58	101.91	28.27
June 8, 1979	835.15	101.49	31.47
June 7, 1979	836.97	101.79	43.38
June 6, 1979	835.50	101.30	39.83
June 5, 1979	831.34	100.62	35.05
June 4, 1979	821.90	99.32	24.04
June 1, 1979	821.21	99.17	24.57