Paul Kangas' Stocks In The News
Tuesday, April 25, 2006
|
|
|
|
PAUL KANGAS: The jump in consumer confidence and the rise in home sales put a damper on stocks this morning on fears that they could keep the Federal Reserve in tightening mode. Stocks did open slightly higher on solid earnings from AT&T and Dupont, but the high price of oil stopped the upturn. At noon, the Dow was off 62 points, NASDAQ down 11. The market trimmed its losses a bit this afternoon, but was hobbled by a poor five- year Treasury note auction which lifted interest rates. Dow Industrial Average closed off 53.07 points at 11,283.25. NASDAQ Composite lost just over three points ending at 2,330.30. Standard & Poor`s 500 Index fell 6.37 to 1,301.74. Over in the bond market, the 10-year note fell 21/32 to 95 20/32, lifting the yield to 5.08 percent. Big board volume leader on 26.8 million shares, Lucent Tech (LU) down $0.04. Of course the company soon to be acquired by France`s Alcatel Corp., but Lucent reported a 33 percent drop in second quarter earnings, $0.04 versus $0.06 a year ago, although that was a little better than expected.
Ford Motor Co (F) a $0.02 gain.
Pfizer (PFE) down $0.07.
AT&T (T) rose $0.07. The company in with first quarter results, $0.52, $0.03 above the Street estimate, excluding charges related to the SBC/AT&T combination.
Nortel Networks (NT) was down $0.02, fifth in big board volume.
Then Time Warner (TWX) a $0.06 gain.
Followed by General Electric (GE) $0.04 rise there.
ExxonMobil (XOM) down $0.46.
Valero Energy (VLO) off $2.80 despite big first quarter earnings of $1.32 versus $0.96 last year, $0.07 above the Street estimate, but a lot of the energy stocks were hit by profit taking today.
Citigroup (C) lost $0.54, tenth in big board volume.
Big blue, IBM (IBM) up $0.56. The company`s boosting its quarterly dividend by 50 percent. That`s the biggest ever in the company`s history. It`ll go from $0.20 to $0.30 quarterly and the company`s also boosting its stock buyback program by $4 billion to a total of $6.5 billion.
Dupont (DD) $0.58 loss. First quarter earnings excluding one time expenses, $0.93 up $0.13 from the Street estimate and the company also boosted its full year outlook, stock still down a bit.
United States Steel (X) off $2.08. First quarter earnings dropped to $2.04, versus $3.51 last year and there is speculation that big steel may bid for AK Steel, just might make a buyout bid.
Alcon Inc (ACL) tumbling $13.32. The eye products company had first quarter earnings of $0.95, up from $0.80 last year, $0.07 better than the Street expected, but the company`s sales and outlook for its restore lens product were quite disappointing. On top of that, Standard & Poor`s downgraded it from "buy" to just a "hold."
The Chicago Mercantile Exchange Holdings (CME) tumbled $18.25 on traded $10 below that during the session. First quarter earnings $2.61, up from $2.04 last year, but $0.02 below the Street estimate. No room for disappointment.
Rayonier (RYN), this is the Timberland real estate investment trust, down $2.80 on lower earnings, first quarter $0.30, down from $0.45 a year ago.
And a home builder with lower stock price and lower earnings, first quarter for M/I Homes (MHO) was $1.14 versus $1.16 last year and that`s despite an increase of 7.3 percent in revenues.
Reynolds American (RAI) up $0.84. The company will acquire smokeless tobacco firm Conwood. The price, $3.5 billion.
And then Indymac Bancorp (NDE) up $3.44. First quarter earnings $1.18, well above last year`s $0.98 and Standard & Poor`s today repeated a "strong buy" on Indymac.
Google (GOOG) topped the active list on NASDAQ with a $13.34 drop.
Intel (INTC) up $0.24.
Microsoft (MSFT) showed no change.
Apple Computer (AAPL) a $0.42 gain.
Sun Microsystems (SUNW) you just heard the interview there, edged up a penny.
Dell (DELL) $0.15 gain.
Cisco Systems (CSCO) $0.18 rise.
Oracle (ORCL) was up $0.17.
Ebay (EBAY) dropped $0.44.
Tenth in dollar volume was Yahoo! (YHOO) with a loss of $1.02 a share.
Amazon.com (AMZN) closed down $0.24. After the close, first quarter earnings came out, $0.12 versus $0.18 a year ago, but revenues exceeded expectations and the stock edged $0.40 higher in after hours trading.
Then Serologicals (SERO) up $7.83. Millipore Corp. will acquire it for $31.55 a share in cash and Millipore stock jumped $5.90 to close at $75.25.
And look at this gain in NutriSystem (NTRI) up $17.31. The company of course sells weight management systems. In its first quarter earnings, weighty indeed, $0.60, way up from $0.10 last year, a six fold increase.
Those are the stocks in the news tonight.
