Paul Kangas' Stocks In The News
Monday, August 14, 2006
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PAUL KANGAS: Stocks staged a strong rally this morning on news of that cease-fire in the Mideast, which, as we told you, sent oil prices tumbling, as did word that BP would keep half of its Alaskan pipeline online. The tech sector also got a boost on upbeat analyst comments about Cisco. So at noon, the Dow was sporting a 111-point gain. NASDAQ was up 35 points. Those gains all but vanished this afternoon as oil rebounded a bit and buyers moved to the sidelines. The Dow Industrial Average ended up only 9.84 points at 11,097.87. The NASDAQ Composite rose 11.33 to 2069.04. Standard & Poor`s 500 was up 1.47, ending at 1268.21. Over in the bond market, the 10-year note fell 7/32 to 99 1/32, putting the yield at 5.00 percent even.
Most active big board issue on 18.6 million shares was EMC Corp (EMC) with a gain of $0.52.
Followed by Lucent Tech (LU) down a penny.
Ford Motor Co (F) moved up $0.46. Bear Stearns upgraded it from "under perform" to "out perform."
At the same time a downgrade in GM (GM) from "peer perform" to "under perform." Nevertheless, GM stock was up $0.09.
Sprint Nextel (S) down $0.16.
General Electric (GE), fifth in big board volume jumped $0.32.
ExxonMobil (XOM) down $0.48 on the lower oil prices.
Pfizer (PFE) $0.26 gain.
No change in Time Warner (TWX).
Home Depot (HD) a penny loss.
And Motorola (MOT), tenth in volume, was up $0.32.
The airlines, which were very weak Friday as you recall, rebounded very nicely today. AMR (AMR), British Airways (BAB), Continental Air (CAL), UAL Corp (UAUA) and US Airways Group (LCC) all in the plus column. They didn`t close at their best levels either.
Piper Jaffray Cos (PJC) up $1.90. The company completed the sale of its brokerage business to UBS financial for $500 million. It would have been $50 million more I should say, but 20 percent of Piper`s brokerage declined to stay on and work for UBS Financial.
Then we see Suntrust Banks (STI) losing $3.05. I think our chart is running a little behind, but anyway, Suntrust, there we see it, down $3.05. The company cut its guidance for 2006 net interest income growth from plus 4 to 5 percent to plus only 3 to 4 percent.
Then Dillard`s "A" (DDS), the big department store chain, up $1.76, a real turnaround. Second quarter earnings of $0.20 versus a loss of $0.15 last year.
And then The Mills Corp (MLS), this is a real estate investment trust and the stock tumbled over $6.50 Friday on concern about its financial condition. But today, the company said it plans the sale of some of its interests and properties in Canada, Scotland and Spain and that will bring in $981 million. That alleviated some of the concern.
Aeropostale (ARO) down $1.24. The marketer of casual apparel was downgraded by Brean Murray brokerage from "accumulate" to "hold," mainly because apparently back to school sales were a bit on the sluggish side.
Weight Watchers Intl (WTW) moving up $3.31. JPMorgan upgraded it from "neutral" to ironically "over weight."
And then we see Chemed (CHE) up $1.28. The company plans to buy back up to $50 million of its own stock.
Most active was Google (GOOG) on NASDAQ with a gain of $0.93.
Followed by Apple Computer (AAPL) $0.29 rise.
Cisco Systems (CSCO) up $0.55. Positive comments in "Baron`s" about Cisco regarding the company`s outlook as the telecom industry upgrades its network.
Then Microsoft (MSFT) a $0.10 gain there.
Intel (INTC) was up $0.46. That was fifth in dollar volume on NASDAQ. Oracle (ORCL) up $0.30.
Dell Inc (DELL) a $0.17 closing gain, but it dropped about $0.40 from there after the close. Dell is recalling 4.1 million notebook computer batteries, the largest safety recall in the history of the consumer electronics industry. The batteries were made for Dell by Sony and could overheat, smoke or catch fire. They were installed in computers sold between April 2004 and July of this year. The Consumer Product Safety Commission said stop using the batteries immediately. Dell said the recall would have no material impact on the company.
Amgen (AMGN) $0.71 loss.
Qualcomm (QCOM) $0.28 gain.
Brocade Comm (BRCD) edged a penny higher.
Whole Foods Market (WFMI) up $3.54. This week, "Baron`s" financial magazine had a positive article, saying despite growing competition, the company has enormous promise. JPMorgan upgraded it from "under weight" to "neutral" today.
Then we see Sonic Incorporated (SONC) up $1.94, Corp I should say, up $1.94. Friday, the company said it would buy back up to 25 1/2 million of its own common shares.
And then Phazar (ANTP), which is in the antenna business, beamed up a little bad news today. Fiscal 2000 earnings came in at $0.49, way down from the previous year`s $0.77 and sales during the period were down 18 percent.
And those are the stocks in the news tonight.
