Case-Shiller Report & Other News

Ahead of Tuesday’s opening bell to start the holiday-shortened week, a new report for Case-Shiller home prices hits the tape: 3.7% gains for March is below the downwardly revised 3.9% job price gains in the previous month. The Case-Shiller report is a laggard in terms of timing — after all, we’re nearly two full months removed from March — but is also considered among the most accurate economic indicators.

Considering the historic strength of the domestic economy on a host of levels — employment, stalled interest rates, even slight but consistent wage growth — these home price results are a bit of a puzzle. The 20-City composite is down 4% year over year to a paltry 2.7%, led by Las Vegas with home price growth of 8.2%. This was followed by Tampa and Phoenix as the biggest gainers.

Fiat-Chrysler (NYSE:C) is in talks to merge with French automaker Renault (PA:RENA), which would create the third-largest auto manufacturer in the world. The deal is reportedly set to be a 50/50 split between the two corporations. Shares of Fiat-Chrysler are up 8% in this morning’s pre-market.

Talks between Citigroup (NYSE:C) and Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) have reportedly broken down. The joint proposal to provide Apple credit cards to consumers seems to have hit a snag in potential profitability — specifically, consumer-friendly components being insisted upon would make it more difficult for the bank to collect from customers. It looks as though we will have to wait for our Apple credit cards.

Later today, we see new earnings reports from enterprise cloud solutions provider Workday (NASDAQ:WDAY) , which looks for its second-straight positive surprise, and Chinese social media platform YY Inc. (NASDAQ:YY) , which has bounced back from appearing as the Zacks Bear of the Day a month ago. Earnings season is winding to a close, but we still see companies worth paying attention to; both WDAY and YY have Zacks Rank #3 (Hold) ratings currently.