Market Minute: Starbucks Milks a Yogurt Deal; Apple Earnings Beat Forecasts

Starbucks plans a big new product line, and a case of when bad is good. Those and more are what's making business news Wednesday.

The Dow industrials (^DJI) rose 22 points Tuesday, enough for another all-time high. But the S&P 500 (^GPSC) lost 3 points, and the Nasdaq (^IXIC) fell 21.

Starbucks (SBUX) continues to expand beyond coffee. It's joining forces with Dannon to make Greek yogurt parfaits. The fast-growing yogurt business in the U.S. is worth more than $6 billion, and analysts say there's still plenty of room to go. Last year, Starbucks expanded its tea business by acquiring the Teavana chain.

Apple's (AAPL) quarterly earnings fell 22 percent from a year ago, but that wasn't as bad as most analysts had forecast. Revenue edged higher as it shipped more than 31 million iPhones. That was well above expectations and the stock is likely to climb this morning.

AT&T's (T) net edged slightly lower, but on the positive it reported the number of new customers signing long-term service contracts nearly doubled from a year ago.

Ford (F) reported better-than-expected second quarter earnings in part due to strong domestic demand for its F-Series pickups. The automaker earned $1.2 billion in the April-June period, propelled by a $2.3 billion profit in North America. Ford shares rose 3 percent in premarket trading.

Among other big names reporting this morning: Boeing (BA), Caterpillar (CAT), Delta Air Lines (DAL) and USAirways (LCC).

Other stocks likely to make big moves to the upside following earnings include video gamemaker Electronic Arts (EA) and software company VMWare (VMW); like to trade to the downside, chipmaker Broadcom (BRCM) and restaurant chain Panera Bread (PNRA).

The big report after the bell today comes from Facebook (FB). The focus will be on how much the company grew its revenue from mobile platforms.

The New York Times reports officials in Louisiana are preparing to file suit against Exxon Mobil (XOM), BP (BP) and other energy companies, accusing them of damaging the coastal wetlands that help protect the region from hurricanes.

A new report shows that Google (GOOG) accounts for nearly a quarter of all the Internet traffic in North America. That's more than Facebook and Twitter combined.

And Carl Icahn, one of those big time investors who can move stock prices, is offering a tease about what he'll do next. CNBC reports that Icahn plans to give clues about his next big investment on Twitter. His handle is @Carl_C_Icahn.

-Produced by Drew Trachtenberg.

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