Israeli mobile phone company Cellcom Israel Ltd. said Thursday that it has received two class-action lawsuits seeking NIS 61 millions ($16.6 million) and NIS 25 millions, respectively. The company did not have a comment about the lawsuits chances of success.

Also on Thursday, the company acknowledged that its network suffered an outage Wednesday. To make amends, it will refund all of its subscribers' calls and text messages for the past week, a concession that the company says will negatively affect its results for the current quarter.

Shares of Cellcom rose 53 cents to $34.18 in afternoon trading.

Wal-Mart is trying to halt the lawsuit, with the backing of many other big companies concerned about rules for class-action cases — those in which people with similar interests increase their leverage by joining in a single claim. Class actions against discount seller Costco and the tobacco industry are among pending claims that the high court's decision might alter.

The suit against Wal-Mart Stores Inc. contends that women at Wal-Mart and Sam's Club stores are paid less and promoted less often than men. The case the high court accepted on Monday will not examine whether the claims are true, only whether they can be tried together.

Estimates of the size of the class range from 500,000 to 1.5 million women who work or once worked for Wal-Mart.

Wal-Mart, based in Bentonville, Ark., is appealing a ruling by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco that the class-action lawsuit could go to trial.

Tobacco giant Altria Corp., Bank of America Corp., Dole Food Company Inc., General Electric Co., Intel Corp., Pepsico Inc. and United Parcel Service Inc. are among the companies that also called for high court review of the case.

The Securities Law Firm of Menzer & Hill, P.A., www.suemyadvisor.com, announced today it filed an arbitration claim against NEXT Financial Group (“NEXT”), for its failure to supervise one of its financial advisors who engaged in unauthorized and excessive trading within an investor’s account.

Consistent with the arbitration claim this Firm just filed, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority’s (“FINRA”) BrokerCheck website, on November 10, 2010, states that NEXT “did not have a reasonable system for reviewing the transactions of its registered representatives for excessive trading.”

Gary Menzer, co-founder and managing partner of Menzer & Hill, P.A., says “the $400K fine and regulatory action FINRA assessed against NEXT is not surprising considering the activity we uncovered in the account of one of our clients and customer of NEXT.”  Investors are encouraged to contact Menzer & Hill, P.A. if they believe their accounts are being excessively traded by their brokers or are subject to other abuses.

The attorneys at the Securities Law Firm of Menzer & Hill, P.A. are dedicated to pursuing claims on behalf of investors who have suffered investment losses. 

For a free case evaluation or to discuss this matter, please contact the Securities Law Firm of Menzer & Hill, P.A., at 888-923-9223, or visit us on the web at www.suemyadvisor.com

A class action has been initiated in the Federal Court by 50 former clients of Bell Potter Securities over the company’s alleged conduct with respect to the purchase of shares in a Brisbane biotechnology company, Progen Pharmaceuticals.

The former clients are being represented by law firm Slater & Gordon, which has said it will be alleged to the court that Bell Potter manipulated the market in Progen shares and engaged in misleading and deceptive conduct when it encouraged clients to buy the overvalued shares ahead of and subsequent to Bell Potter being a co-underwriter of a Progen capital raising.

Slater and Gordon solicitor Van Moulis said it was being alleged in the class action that reports published by Bell Potter analysts improperly inflated the value of Progen stock and were then used by brokers to promote the stock to clients.

He said investors were seeking compensation from Bell Potter for their share trading losses, legal costs plus interest.

Bell Potter has indicated it will be vigorously defending the claim.

An unexpected rise in the U.S. unemployment rate is pushing stocks down as investors move money into safer assets.

The government reported that the unemployment rate climbed to 9.8 percent in November, a seven-month high. That's up from 9.6 percent the previous month. Employers added 39,000 jobs. Economists had forecast a gain of 145,000.

The Dow Jones industrial average is down 25, or 0.2 percent, to 11,337.

The S&P 500 index is down 4, or 0.3 percent, to 1,217. The Nasdaq composite index is off 1.51, or 0.1 percent, to 2,577.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury note is down to 2.96 percent from 3.00 percent late Thursday. That yield helps set interest rates on many loans, including home mortgages.