News stories from Friday March 10, 1978

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

Unemployment declined to 6.1 percent in February, the lowest since October 1974, the Labor Department said. The jobless rate for blacks and adult women showed the largest declines. Black unemployment fell almost a percentage point, to 11.8 percent. The rate for women declined to 5.7 percent from 6.1 percent. The rate for adult men, the lowest of any group, also declined, to 4.5 percent from 4.7 percent. New jobs, though, were not coming up so quickly, and there were fewer employed teenagers. Nevertheless, the administration found the figures encouraging, and Treasury Secretary Michael Blumenthal said that inflation was now the biggest problem. [New York Times] Renewed bargaining on a coal strike settlement adjourned in Washington, and talks were scheduled to resume tomorrow. A 10-man United Mine Workers negotiating team met with a new top-level coal industry group headed by Nicholas Camicia, chairman of the Pittston Company. [New York Times] The dollar rallied strongly in foreign exchange markets in Europe on the strength of expectations that the United States and West Germany would announce measures this weekend to strengthen the weakened dollar. Official sources at the West German central bank in Frankfurt said that an agreement on concrete proposals might result from weekend telephone conversations between Under Secretary of the Treasury Anthony Solomon and the West German Finance Minister, Manfred Lahnstein. [New York Times] The stock market had its best day in 1978, responding enthusiastically to a strengthening of the dollar abroad and an unexpected decline in the unemployment rate at home. More than 1,000 issues on the New York Stock Exchange rose in price, and the Dow Jones industrial average climbed 8.58 points to 758.58. [New York Times] Citibank will not make further loans to the South African government or to government-owned manufacturing and utility enterprises. The decision was announced in a proxy statement to shareholders of Citicorp, Citibank's parent company. Citibank has participated with other major American banks in major loan consortiums organized on South Africa's behalf, and this has led to charges that the bank was a supporter of South Africa's apartheid policy. It was among 11 American banks that had a total of $2.2 billion in loans to South Africa outstanding at the beginning of 1977. [New York Times] New tariff reductions are likely to result from the multi-national trade negotiations underway in Geneva, Alonzo McDonald, the United States deputy special negotiator, said in an interview in New York. He said that there was better than a 50-50 chance for success. The chief negotiators at the talks -- conducted under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade -- are the United States, the nine European Common Market countries and Japan. They have agreed to reach agreement on proposed tariff cuts on industrial products by July of this year. [New York Times] Opposition to President Carter's decision to link the sale of advanced planes to Israel to similar sales to Saudi Arabia and Egypt was expressed by the majority of the members of a key House committee. A letter of protest was sent to Mr. Carter by 21 of the 37 members of the International Relations Committee only hours before he was to meet with Defense Minister Ezer Weizman of Israel, who has also been urging the administration to reconsider the "package" arrangement. [New York Times] South Africa freed 10 of the blacks seized in a crackdown on dissenters last year, including the country's foremost black editor, Percy Qoboza. Justice Minister James Kruger said that the calm in Soweto, the huge black township outside Johannesburg that had become the center of anti-government demonstrations, had led to the decision and that if Soweto remained quiet others would be released. [New York Times] African nations blocked a Security Council hearing for Bishop Abel Muzorewa, one of Rhodesia's internal black leaders who signed a majority-rule agreement with Prime Minister Ian Smith last week. Western diplomats said Bishop Muzorewa had come to the United Nations to defend the accord, in which guerrillas fighting Mr. Smith's government were not represented. The Bishop was said to have decided not to press for a hearing when it became obvious that Africans opposing the agreement had mustered enough votes to prevent his appearance. [New York Times]

Stock Market Report

Dow Jones Industrial Average: 758.58 (+8.58, +1.14%)
S&P Composite: 88.88 (+0.99, +1.13%)
Arms Index: 0.67

	Issues	Volume*
Advances	1,147	20.33
Declines	327	3.88
Unchanged	379	2.88
Total Volume		27.09

* 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*
March 9, 1978	750.00	87.89	21.82
March 8, 1978	750.87	87.84	22.04
March 7, 1978	746.79	87.36	19.90
March 6, 1978	742.72	86.90	17.23
March 3, 1978	747.31	87.45	20.12
March 2, 1978	746.45	87.32	20.29
March 1, 1978	743.33	87.19	21.01
February 28, 1978	742.12	87.04	19.75
February 27, 1978	748.35	87.72	20.00
February 24, 1978	756.24	88.49	22.51