Wednesday morning headlines

Stocks taking off: The GDP news is not upending Wall Street, perhaps because the report includes some encouraging numbers about consumer spending. After about an hour of trading, the Dow is up almost 160 points.

No cruising to Mexico: Many of the big lines have suspended all stops because of the swine flu outbreak. To avoid docking at Mexican ports, ships will either be routed to San Diego or Catalina (good for those economies) or will spend additional time at sea. From the LAT:

Laura Sterling, community manager for CruiseCritic.com, an online cruise line review site, sent the following message from the Carnival Spendor on Tuesday, off the Mexican coast: "We just received word that we'll be making an unscheduled 'technical' stop in Cabo this afternoon at 2:45 pm. No one will be debarking. Speculation among the hosts and myself is that we'll be heading north soon afterward, and maybe porting in San Diego and/or Catalina?. . ."Mood on board seems fine at this point. I suspect people really aren't paying that close attention to what the captain is saying. . . "

Big day for B of A: The fate of chairman and CEO Ken Lewis is being determined this morning at the bank's annual meeting. WSJ reports that Lewis appears to have enough votes to win reelection as CEO but a measure to force him out as chairman is too close to call.

The latest public sign of dissatisfaction with Mr. Lewis came when the California Public Employees' Retirement System said Tuesday it will vote against the re-election of all 18 BofA directors. In all, pension funds and other investors controlling more than 172 million shares, or 2.6% of the total, have announced their intent to vote for a boardroom shake-up, according to a tally by The Wall Street Journal.

Danny Pang arrested: The OC money manager, accused by the SEC of defrauding investors out of hundreds of millions of dollars, was picked up by FBI agents on suspicion of evading currency reporting laws. From the LAT:

According to an affidavit, the FBI focused on a series of check-cashing transactions at the East West Bank branch in El Monte. Pang's aim was to convert cash to gold bullion, which he tucked away in a safe concealed in a bedroom closet, the affidavit said. Agents seized an undisclosed amount of gold during a search of Pang's Newport Beach home Tuesday, according to a law enforcement source who was not authorized to speak publicly.

Socal tops in pollution - again: Three California cities -- Long Beach, L.A. and Riverside -- remained the metro areas with the highest levels of ozone pollution, as they have in each of the past 10 reports from the American Lung Association. (AP)

Tribune Co. pays Zell's legal bills: The company's chairman and CEO has been interviewed as a potential witness in the corruption investigation of former Gov. Rod Blagojevich. Tribune, of course, has filed for bankruptcy, and Zell is a billionaire, so it's not exactly a great PR move. Zell's lawyer says that his client is not "the subject of the investigation." (Chicago Tribune)

Demise of KFWB: LAT has a James Rainey column and a Steve Carney story that says pretty much the same thing: KFWB has essentially dropped its all-news format, and on the weekends it's gone further by airing infomercials, some of which sound like long news reports. From Rainey:

Everything seemed normal through a "Traffic on the Ones" freeway update, then a weather report. But instead of following with its regular staple of headlines and terse field reports, KFWB jumped to an interview program. The earnest host assured us we would get to the bottom of this sticky mortgage mess. He bantered lightly with an expert guest, who sounded as blandly affable as the computer Hal in "2001." Together, they promised a wondrous payoff, if only I would call this toll-free number or visit that website. Somewhere before the next segment ("Experience the miracle of fish oil!") I emerged from my haze, realizing that dear old News 980, "All News All the Time," survived in name only.

More greed: Oliver Stone will be directing a sequel to 1987's "Wall Street," with Michael Douglas starring. The recent financial meltdown will figure into the script. (Variety)