Wall Street ends down 45 points

CNBC's Bertha Coombs - A late day rally on Wall Street on reports that a bailout for bond insurer Ambac may be near at hand. The Dow paring a 200 point loss to close down just 45 points on the day, the S&P losing 4 points and Nasdaq ending up by 1.5 points. Ambac shares rose 9% as CNBC Charlie Gasparino reported a deal to recaptalise the bond insurer could come as soon as Tuesday night.

Financials hit a new low on the day though on concerns about Citigroup. Merrill Lynch cutting Citi’s estimates saying that the bank could write-down another USD 18 billion in debt this quarter. The Head of Dubai Investments says Citi is going to need more sovereign fund cash to offset those write downs but Citi says its capital levels are strong.

Intel meantime warning that its margins will be down 2 points during its fiscal first quarter because of a significant drop in memory chip prices. That weighed on technology with Google shares hitting an 18-month low as one of its legal advisor jumped ship for Facebook. But Applied Material shares were up 8% on the day on news of a USD 2 billion solar panel deal, the largest order in the company’s history in that sector. But there is no word on who the buyer is.

Apple also closing up 2% on the day as Steve Jobs tells shareholders that the company will sell 10 million phones this year and they will begin selling in Asia. But there is no indication on when they will enter the China market. Jobs says they have no plans for share buybacks or stocks dividends.