Monday morning headlines

Mixed market: Concerns about the Dubai debt situation are being weighed against a decent holiday shopping weekend. The Dow is up 45 points in early trading.

Latest on Dubai: The government says it would not guarantee the debt of Dubai World, which presumably means that investors would be on the short stick of billions of dollars. But it's a very confusing story, and today's comments don't help much. From the FT:

Abdulrahman al-Saleh, director general of Dubai's department of finance, said in an interview with Dubai TV that creditors had to take responsibility for their own lending decisions and differentiate between advances to companies and the state. He also said global markets had overreacted to the news.

Black Friday results: Lots more shoppers than last year, but the average amount spent by each shopper declined. From the NYT:

Most people shopped on Friday because they saw an advertisement for a deal that was too good to pass up or because they feared a chain would run out of an item they wanted, said Marshal Cohen, chief industry analyst for the NPD Group, which studied shopping behavior over Thanksgiving weekend. On a quest for value and one-stop shopping, a majority of consumers bought at big discount chains like Wal-Mart, spending $50 to $99.99 each. The good news for retailers was that consumers opened their wallets for some discretionary items, albeit cheap ones.

Cyber Monday awaits: Expect the usual rush of online orders on this first regular work day after Thanksgiving. Actually, the big shopping day has lost some punch - since so many households now have high-speed Internet, there's not all that much reason to wait until Monday. (Reuters)

Losing confidence: More than six in 10 small business owners surveyed in November rate the economy as poor, while 19 percent say economic conditions are getting better, down from 29 percent in October. Results were released by Discover Small Business Watch. (OC Register)

Box office breaks record: Weekend ticket sales generated $275 million, beating the previous mark set in 2000 by 12 percent. "The Twilight Saga: New Moon" led the way, but "The Blind Side" was a surprisingly close No. 2. (LAT)

New slant on THR deal: Lachlan Murdoch, eldest son of Rupert, is going after The Reporter, along with Billboard, Adweek and a few others. Murdoch is joining James Finkelstein, publisher of The Hill, and a bunch of other rich guys. (Financial Times)

Trashing toy district: Refuse is starting to pile up on Los Angeles Street in downtown L.A., the result of a squabble between local business owners and the Central City East Association. From the Downtown News:

Last year the CCEA could not rally the support to renew the Toy District BID for another five-year term starting in 2010 (the months-long renewal process requires signatures from property owners representing at least 50% of the District's land). Many landlords cited the poor economy and a dip in the rental market, saying they could not afford the annual dues, which range from a few hundred to more than $100,000. Now, with the BID's last days approaching, the roughly $500,000 annual budget is dwindling and BID workers have stopped removing the area's commercial trash [said CCEA Executive Director Estela Lopez].