Stock Market News: Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C), J.P. Morgan Chase (NYSE: JPM), Goldman Sachs Group (NYSE: GS)

Citigroup Inc. (NYSE: C) posted a $101 million profit, defying expectations for a loss, as the company slowed the pace of building reserves for future loan defaults. The third-quarter profit compared with a loss of $2.82 billion a year earlier, the New York-based bank said today in a statement. On a per-share basis, the company had a loss of 27 cents because of a charge related to the exchange of government- and privately held preferred shares into common stock. Eighteen analysts surveyed  estimated a loss of 29 cents. -Bloomberg

Goldman Sachs Group (NYSE: GS), which continued to benefit handsomely from the recovery of credit markets and the retreat of rivals like Lehman Brothers, said its third-quarter profit rose to $3.19 billion, or $5.25 a share, from $845 million, or $1.81 a share, in the year-ago period. Goldman’s strong results follow a similar report from J.P. Morgan Chase (NYSE: JPM), which stated Wednesday that its results topped estimates and also said that signs of economic recovery, albeit tentative, are emerging. Goldman’s famed trading operation posted revenue of $10.03 billion, compared to $2.70 billion last year, but dipped from the record second-quarter 2009 level of $10.78 billion.-Marketwatch

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged to 10015.86, passing the symbolic 10000 level much faster than expected and racking up a 53% gain in just seven months. Wednesday’s trading marked the first time the Dow touched 10000 since October last year, when markets were unraveling after the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings. As recently as March 9, the Dow was at 6547.05. Reaction this time was more muted than the first time the Dow closed above the 10000 mark, on March 29, 1999, when traders popped Champagne and passed around “Dow 10000″ baseball caps. –The Wall Street Journal

More than 937,840 properties in the third quarter received a foreclosure filing — which can include a default notice, scheduled auction or bank repossession, according to the U.S. Foreclosure Market Report released by RealtyTrac. That’s nearly a 23 percent increase over Q3 2008, but just a 5 percent increase over Q2 2009. This breaks all records since RealtyTrac began issuing foreclosure reports in the first quarter of 2005. –Daily Finance
Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said on Thursday he was not too worried about the latest bout of selling in the U.S. dollar, which recently hit a 14-month low. But he said that, longer term, government budget deficits would likely be even bigger than current record estimates. He added that the deficits would continue to put downward pressure on the currency and upward pressure on borrowing costs. “It will begin to affect the yield on long-term interest rates,” he said. When asked about the problem of firms that are considered too large to fail, Greenspan said, “If they are too big to fail, they’re too big.” -Reuters

Nokia Corp. has reported a loss of 559 million euro ($832 million) in the third quarter as sales dropped 20 percent. The world’s largest mobile phone maker made a profit of 1.09 billion euro in the same period last year. Sales fell to 9.81 billion euro, from 12.2 billion euro in the third quarter of 2008. -Forbes

-Jutia Group