NASDAQ OMX GROUP

A year ago, Apple had its weight in the Nasdaq 100 cut in half after having grown to where it tipped the scales at more than one-fifth of the index.

Goldman Sachs Group has suspended coverage of 18 discount brokers, exchanges and small investment banks because the analyst who follows them has left the firm.

Websites of exchange operators Nasdaq and BATS have been attacked by hackers over the last 24 hours, causing ongoing disruptions for those trying to use the sites, spokespersons for the companies said on Tuesday.

Nasdaq OMX Group Inc.'s core profit topped analysts' expectations for the fourth quarter, boosted by a rise in revenue from market data and technology, which helped offset a soft trading environment.

Symantec Corp, the top maker of security software, said hackers had exposed a chunk of its source code, which is essentially the blueprint for its products, potentially giving rivals some insight into the company's technology.

Security software maker McAfee laid off about 250 workers, equivalent to 3 percent of its workforce, in a bid to focus on core businesses and improve efficiency in a market led by rival Symantec.

The combination will create the largest bourse in Asia -- with listed stocks having a value of $3.6-trillion.

A federal investigation into last year's cyber attack on Nasdaq OMX Group found surprisingly lax security practices that made the exchange operator an easy target for hackers, people with knowledge of the probe said. The sources did not want to be identified because the matter is classified.

The National Security Agency, a secretive arm of the U.S. military, has begun providing Wall Street banks with intelligence on foreign hackers, a sign of growing U.S. fears of financial sabotage.

Stock index futures rose on Wednesday after the S&P fell 2 percent in the previous session as optimism about corporate earnings offset concerns about an upcoming meeting of European leaders to tackle the region's debt crisis.

Stock index futures rose on Wednesday after the S&P fell 2 percent in the previous session as optimism about corporate earnings offset concerns about the results of a meeting of European leaders to tackle the region's debt crisis.

Hackers who infiltrated the Nasdaq's computer systems installed malicious software on the exchange's computers that allowed them to spy on scores of directors of publicly held companies, according to two people familiar with an investigation into the matter.

By accumulating enough shares, stockholders would have the ammunition to force changes to the company's board.

The top after-market NASDAQ Stock Market gainers are: Zhongpin, Dynamic Materials, ImmunoGen, NASDAQ OMX and Silicon Motion Technology. The top after-market NASDAQ Stock Market losers are: Hanwha SolarOne Co, CNinsure, First Solar, Steven Madden and Central European Media Enterprises.

Hurricane Irene shut down the neon lights on Broadway, and substantially reduced commercial activity over the weekend -- including canceling thousands of flights, but the storm's economic damage will likely be far less than originally predicted. In particular, New Yorkers, for the most part, feel like they were spared.

A former Nasdaq OMX Group Inc executive was sentenced Friday to 3-1/2 years in prison after pleading guilty for making hundreds of thousands of dollars by trading on confidential information.

The operator of the Nasdaq Stock Market is "under constant attack" from would-be hackers and will spend more on security as a result, its top executive said.

The top after-market NASDAQ Stock Market gainers are: Radiant Systems, Clean Energy Fuels, Idenix Pharmaceuticals, Micromet, and Nasdaq OMX Group. The top after-market NASDAQ Stock Market losers are: Microchip Technology, Novellus Systems, China Gerui Advanced Materials Group, KLA-Tencor, and Intersil.

The top after-market NASDAQ Stock Market gainers are: Gulf Resources, Sino Clean Energy, Photronics, ChinaCast Education, On Track Innovations, and Novellus Systems. The top after-market NASDAQ Stock Market losers are: Metabolix, Callidus Software, TICC Capital, Integrated Device Technology, and AVEO Pharmaceuticals.

The top pre-market NASDAQ Stock Market gainers are: CNinsure, Telestone Technologies, EnerNOC, Tranzyme and SIGA Technologies. The top pre-market NASDAQ Stock Market losers are: Sina Corp, ANADIGICS, ARM Holdings, NASDAQ OMX Group and Baidu.

The companies whose shares are moving in pre-market trade on Monday are: Ford Motor, Caterpillar, Sandisk, NYSE Euronext, Lowes Companies, Advanced Micro Devices, Peabody Energy and Carnival Corp.