Paul Kangas' Stocks In The News
Thursday, August 10, 2006
|
|
|
|
PAUL KANGAS: Stocks opened with mostly minor weakness in reaction to that terrorist airline plot, presumably because it was foiled. At the outset of trading, the Dow and the NASDAQ lost only about five points. That resilience boosted the market by noon time, when the Dow was up 22 points, NASDAQ up six points. A steep drop in oil prices added to bullish confidence this afternoon. So the Dow Industrial Average closed with a gain of 48.19 at 11,124.37. The NASDAQ Composite was up 11.46 ending at 2071.74. Standard & Poor`s 500 rose 5.86 points to 1271.80. The Treasury auctioned off $10 million worth of 30-year bonds today, getting a lackluster reception and a yield of 5.08 percent. In the regular trading session, the 10-year note gained 4/32 to 99 17/32 and that put the yield at 4.94 percent.
Most active New York exchange issue on 13.4 million shares, ExxonMobil (XOM) moving up $0.40 despite the plunge in oil prices.
SprintNextel (S) $0.13 loss.
EMC Corp (EMC) was up $0.29.
General Electric (GE), $0.39 gain. Pfizer (PFE) fifth in volume fell $0.18 a share.
Ford Motor Co (F) edged up $0.06.
Time Warner (TWX) a $0.20 gain.
Bristol Myers Squibb (BMY) down $0.29.
Disney (DIS) up $0.75. As we reported yesterday, Disney`s third quarter earnings jumped 40 percent to $0.53 a share.
Then tenth in volume was AT&T (T) with a $0.02 loss.
American Intl Group (AIG), which is a member of the Dow Industrial average, up $1.83. Second quarter earnings excluding one time items, $1.58 a share. That was $0.19 above the Street consensus and the Credit Suisse brokerage said it believes most of the turmoil in the company had been experiencing is now over.
Then we see a good loss or a bad loss I should say in World Fuel Services (INT) off $6.60, traded as low as $37.96. The company did report higher second quarter earnings of $0.50, up from $0.40 a year ago, but it`s in the aviation fueling business and the terrorist threat to airlines could hurt that business. Airline stocks were surprisingly firm today however.
Unitedhealth Group (UNH) off $1.58. The company is going to delay its second quarter results to review the stock option grants. AIG Edwards brokerage downgraded the stock from "buy" to just a "hold" recommendation.
Target Corp (TGT) up $2.44. Second quarter earnings were much higher, $0.70, up from $0.61 a year ago, a penny above the Street estimate and revenues up a very respectable 11 percent during that period.
JC Penney Co (JCP), another strong retailing stock, up $1.58. JCP second quarter earnings on an operating basis, $0.75, up from $0.46 a year ago, $0.04 above the Street estimate. The stock did well.
Viacom "B" (VIAb) up $3.27. Second quarter earnings excluding one time items, $0.48 a share, $0.04 above the Street estimate and revenues up 24 percent.
One of the big percentage losers, 4kids entertainment (KDE) dropping $1.97. The company had a second quarter operating loss of $0.05 a share and the Street was looking for earnings of $0.06. Revenues actually fell 9 percent during that period. Brinker Intl (EAT), the restaurant chain, owns Chili`s and Macaroni Grill, up $2.92. Fourth quarter earnings $0.75, up from $0.69 a year ago. Revenues up 7 1/2 percent. Those earnings incidentally 10 percent above the Street estimate.
Best percentage gainer on the big board, Tenet Healthcare (THC) up $0.78. Second quarter operating earnings were out, $0.03 a share on the plus column versus a loss of $0.02 last year, a lot better than the Street was expecting.
Apple Computer (AAPL) topped the NASDAQ actives, up $0.48.
Followed by Google (GOOG) down $2.74.
Cisco Systems (CSCO) fell $0.22.
But Intel (INTC) rose $0.35.
Research in Motion (RIMM) up $5.54 on optimism over the company`s new Blackberry pearl device to be introduced by TMobile next month. That was fifth in volume.
Cephalon (CEPH) plunging $8.05. The biotech firm had a rejection by the FDA for its drug for attention deficit disorder, going to discontinue production.
Microsoft (MSFT) $0.02 gain.
Oracle (ORCL) up $0.18.
Qualcomm (QCOM) $0.37 rise.
Filenet (FILE) up $1.52. IBM will buy it for $35 a share.
Imclone Systems (IMCL) down $4.32. The company says it`s going to remain independent after a fruitless six month search for a buyer.
And then another big loser was Imax Corp (IMAX). It couldn`t find a buyer either in recent times, so it gave up apparently on that idea.
And those are the stocks in the news tonight.
