Business news for Mon, 24 Dec 2007 & with word flat. 6 news.

Wall Street stocks were set for a flat start ahead of an abbreviated Christmas Eve trading session with Merrill Lynch's sale of a lending unit the pick of corporate deal news

On the morning of the last trading session before Christmas, stock futures pointed to a flat open.

FT.com - Wall Street stocks were set for a flat start on Monday ahead of an abbreviated Christmas Eve trading session with Merrill Lynch's sale of a lending unit the pick of corporate deal news.

Reuters - Wall Street was set for a flat start on Monday in a shortened Christmas Eve trading session after an explosive rally on Friday.

[Food] Mintel says cookies are under pressure from the proliferation of other sweets, from ice cream, to candy and cakes, refrigerated dough, baking mixes, frozen desserts. That means opportunities for cookie makers resemble other markets: specialization catering to adults. And making cookies more "manly" by adding large chunks of chocolate or nuts could spur more men to eat them.

With baker Grupo Bimbo bowing out of the bidding mix for bankrupt Interstate Bakeries Corp., its former partners turned in a $580 million offer for IBC that the company said didn't qualify as a bid.