Stocks to Watch: Apple, Williams-Sonoma, McDonald's (Update 1)

NEW YORK -- Apple(AAPL) and five of the biggest U.S. publishers have been warned by the Justice Department it plans to sue them for allegedly colluding to raise the price of electronic books, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

Several of the parties have held talks to settle the antitrust case and head off a court battle, the people told the newspaper. A successful settlement could potentially lead to cheaper e-books for consumers.

The five publishers facing a potential suit are CBS'(CBS) Simon & Schuster; Lagardere's Hachette Book Group; Pearson's(PSO) Penguin Group (USA); Macmillan, a unit of Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck GmbH; and HarperCollins Publishers, a unit of News Corp. (NWSA) .

Apple unveiled a new version of its iPad tablet on Wednesday.

Shares were up 0.7% to $534.41 in premarket trading.

The U.S. Treasury is selling $6 billion worth of its bailout-related holdings in insurance giant American International Group(AIG) .

AIG is expected to purchase up to $3 billion worth of the stock being sold by the Treasury, which will still hold nearly $42 billion sunk into the company following its 2008 bailout.

Shares were down 1.8% to $28.92.

Specialty retailer Williams-Sonoma (WSM) beat estimates by posting fourth-quarter earnings of $1.17 a share on revenue of $1.27 billion. Analysts were looking for profit of $1.13 a share on sales of $1.25 billion.

For the first quarter, the company gave earnings guidance of 29 cents to 32 cents a shareon revenue ranging from $800 million to $820 million. Analysts forecast earnings of 33 cents a share on revenue of $805.2 million.

Shares were lower by 0.4% to $37.69.