Retail investors have long had to suffer the jargon and weirdness of same-store-sales reports and non-standard earnings periods. 
    So when Amazon.com announced it had its best 2007 holiday season ever, it offered a glimpse a new kind metrics, numbers perhaps more relevant to the 21st century, Web-savvy consumer.
    Amazon said in a news release its busiest day of its busiest season was Dec. 10 when 5.4 million items, or 62.5 items per second, were ordered. Last Dec. 11, their busiest day of the 2006 holiday rush, it had more than 4 million orders.
    It didn’t offer any overall metrics for the holiday period, or offer anything in dollars and cents. But here are a few of the factoids Amazon did disclose:
    
* Amazon.com sold Nintendo Wii systems at approximately 17 per second when they were in stock.
* Amazon.com sold enough high-def DVD players to cover seven football fields.
* If you lined up all of the GPS units Amazon.com sold this holiday, they would make a trail from New York to Philadelphia; however, a new trail wouldn’t be necessary with  the use of a GPS.  (sic)
* Amazon.com sold enough auto wrenches to stretch all the way around the Daytona 500 track.
* Amazon.com sold enough Hannah Montana wigs to outfit the
entire audience at her December 20th show in Providence, RI.

** Sun Capital Securities Group is baring its teeth at takeover target Kellwood, owner of clothing brands Nautica, Baby Phat and Hollywould. Sun said it was prepared to pony up the entire $544 million from its own capital and its proposal had no financing contingency. Kellwood rejected Sun's unsolicited takeover bid last month. It posted a second-quarter loss and slashed its full-year earnings forecast due to caution about a slowdown in consumer spending. It also recently announced a restructuring to have fewer operating divisions. The Wall Street Journal notes Kellwood has a number of rules that could complicate a hostile Sun tender or proxy contest.  (VF Corp. owns Nautica, not Kellwood).

** After half its market value was erased on Monday, investors are pondering the future Internet broker E*Trade Financial. TD Ameritrade Holding has already expressed an interest, and the New York Times reports some say it could try again but others doubt it will would want to revisit talks amid the recent turmoil. 
 
** Barr Pharmaceuticals may looking for European supplements. "I think it would be more of the small pieces that complement or add to what we already have, as opposed to some new geographic expansion," said Chief Executive Officer Bruce Downey at the Reuters Health Summit. Barr bought Croatia's Pliva for $2.5 billion last year, making it a world-class generic drug company. Barr now has expanded its sales into Germany, Croatia, Russia and Poland. The drug company released disappointing results last week, which were hit by soaring sales. The Motley Fool said the results were also clouded by the Pliva acquisition.  
 
** The Washington Post reports powerful U.S. dealmakers are going to China to keep the buyout boom going. It cites Dealogic data showing that while buyouts were slowing in the United States because of turmoil in the credit markets, deals involving U.S. private-equity firms in China reached $3.1 billion in June, a record month. "In three years, U.S. private-equity money in China has grown almost sixfold," it said.  
 

Lone Star Funds, which has been seeking to abandon its purchase of Accredited Home Lenders Holding Co, is set to buy the struggling subprime mortgage lender for a reduced price of $8.50 a share. Accredited shares closed on the Nasdaq at $6.31 on Thursday.
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Vivendi dismissed recent speculation it was interested in buying German Pay TV broadcaster Premiere.
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Big U.S. and Canadian investors are set to push for the merger of TSX Group Inc and Montreal Exchange Inc. The exchanges have been in serious talks since this summer, the Globe and Mail reports.
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Nortel has joined the line of interested suitors in Tellabs Inc, according to a report in Web site Light Reading. Citing an unnamed Wall Street source, the telecom-industry focused Web site said Nortel is prepared to pay as much as $7.4-billion.
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With some deals looking shaky, the Deal Journal reports that peddlers of M&A rumors are starting to rear their heads again, noting that shares of Newmont Mining soared on rumors it would be bought by Barrick Gold for as much as $25 billion.
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China’s economic boom is driving up prices for bilingual bankers. Hedge funds and private equity firms, which are starting to source deals in China, are poaching bankers from Wall Street firms, making the hunt for already scarce talent even tougher.
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Thailand is pressuring Exxon and Chevron to make good on a pledge made 15 years ago to float shares in their local oil refineries in Bangkok next year. Many foreign investors are wary about Thailand after last year’s military coup.
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The storm in global credit markets has stalled Japanese leveraged buyouts and left banks exposed to unwanted risk, although deep-pocketed and conservative local banks are expected to act as a buffer. Deals disrupted by the credit squeeze include the syndication of buyout debt for MBK Partners’ acquisition of software firm Yayoi, Advantage Partners’ purchase of Tokyo Star Bank Ltd and Liberty Global Inc’s capital-raising, according to financial sources.
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Gottschalks Inc said it ended a strategic review that included a possible sale of the company, and decided to focus on a revised business plan to improve sales and operating performance as it posted a quarterly loss significantly wider than what analysts expected.