Wall Street Morning Brief: Yahoo’s BIG Turnaround Underway, News Corp MISSES

Standard Chartered (SCBFF.PK) may counter-sue New York’s Department of Financial Services for reputational damage after this week’s allegations against the bank’s Iranian transactions, reported the Financial Times. Months ago, Standard Chartered offered to pay a $5 million settlement for the $14 million in transactions that  had violated U.S. law but had been shot down; instead, the DFS is looking at damages of more than $500 million.

Zynga’s (NASDAQ:ZNGA) COO John Schappert has resigned from his role at the company and his board position. The news comes just a week after CEO Mark Pincus supposedly took away his responsibilities overseeing the company’s game development efforts. Investors didn’t take that news well.

In her short Yahoo (NASDAQ:YHOO) tenure, CEO Marissa Mayer is already concentrating on product development as expected, reported the Wall Street Journal. Her mantra has consistently been, ”I want you thinking about users.” In addition, she is also interested in either developing or buying products in mobile, social, and local services; Mayer also wants to update Yahoo Search.

News Corp. (NASDAQ:NWS) reported a fourth quarter $1.55 billion net loss, down from the previous year’s $683 million; it also took a $2.85 billion of non-cash restructuring and impairment charges. The loss comes as News Corp. is dividing into two companies. Adjusted earnings per share was in line with estimates but fell to $0.32 from $0.35. Revenue declined 6.6 percent and missed consensus.

Knight Capital (NYSE:KCG) had around $7 billion in stock at one point during last week’s IT trading mishap but had sold $2.4 billion of it by day’s end, reported the Wall Street Journal. Knight got rid of the portfolio’s balance to Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) after rebuffing a UBS (NYSE:UBS) bid; the firm still took a $440 million loss from the entire debacle.