Paul Kangas' Stocks In The News
Thursday, September 28, 2006
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PAUL KANGAS: Stocks opened on the upside with the Dow moving a few points above a record high on an early 35 point gain, thanks to a rise in General Motors stock, which we`ll detail shortly. Buyers had little conviction though, so by noon, the Dow had fallen to a 19-point loss and NASDAQ was off six points. Higher oil prices and bond prices stopped a late rebound in the Dow, just 4 1/2 points short of the record. So, the blue chips ended up 29.21 at 11,718.45. The NASDAQ Composite was up 6.63 ending at 2270.02. Standard & Poor`s 500 Index rose 2.56 to 1339.15. Over in the bond market, the 10-year note lost 3/32 to 102 1/32, putting the yield at 4.62 percent.
Big board volume leader on 32.1 million shares, Time Warner (TWX) down $0.39. JPMorgan today downgraded it from "over weight" to just a "neutral" rating.
ExxonMobil (XOM) up $0.33.
Ford Motor Co (F) $0.16 rise.
AT&T (T) lost $0.20.
And Halliburton Co (HAL) down $0.38, fifth in big board volume.
Pfizer (PFE) fell $0.11.
General Electric (GE) moving up $0.14.
Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) a $0.25 loss.
SprintNextel (S) $0.13 drop.
Tenth in volume was Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) gaining $0.58. Late today, Verizon Wireless filed a lawsuit against 20 unnamed individuals who used deceptive means allegedly to obtain telephone records on behalf of Hewlett- Packard.
Accenture Ltd (ACN) up $2.24. The company will transfer a $3.7 billion nine-year United Kingdom national health services contract to Computer Sciences. Analysts say the move is good for both firms. Computer Sciences moved up $1.05. And then after the close, Accenture reported fourth quarter earnings nicely high, $0.56 versus $0.38 a year ago.
On the downside, American Greetings (AM), as we touched on, down $2.21. The company reported a second quarter loss of $0.18 a share versus a nickel earnings a year ago and revenues actually fell 6 1/2 percent. Standard & Poor`s today issued a "sell" recommendation.
Amdocs Ltd (DOX), this is a software solutions company, Morgan Stanley downgraded it from "over weight" to "equal weight" on a valuation basis.
Then we see HB Fuller Co (FUL) down $1.55. That stock was up $4.77 yesterday on strong third quarter earnings, but today JPMorgan downgraded it from "over weight" to "neutral" on a valuation basis after yesterday`s 23 percent surge on those earnings.
GATX Corp (GMT), known for its leasing of rail cars and locomotives, was up $2.68. The company`s going to sell a majority of its aircraft leasing business to an investment group for about $500 million.
Then SRA Intl (SRX) up $1.61. The company won $173 million contract from the Army National Guard for security and other services.
And then Texas Industries (TXI), which is in the building materials business, up nicely, a gain of $1.88. First quarter earnings came in at $1.12. That was up $0.05 from the Wall Street consensus.
Autozone (AZO) down $1.19. Standard & Poor`s downgraded it from "buy" to "hold" on valuation and also the news is that Edward Lampert (ph) will not stand for reelection for the board of directors of Autozone.
Google (GOOG) topped the active list on NASDAQ, $0.66 gain.
And then Intel (INTC) $0.38 rise.
Apple Computer (AAPL) $0.60 gain there.
Microsoft (MSFT) was down $0.04.
Cisco Systems (CSCO) $0.13 rise, fifth in dollar volume.
Qualcomm (QCOM) down $1.11.
Amgen (AMGN) fell $0.59.
Yahoo! (YHOO) $0.68 gainer. Oracle (ORCL) up $0.06.
And Sandisk (SNDK) down $1.12.
Align Technology (ALGN), look at that percentage gain, up $3.76. The company reached a settlement regarding teeth straightening products with a company called OrthoClear. JPMorgan upgraded Align incidentally from "under weight" to "neutral."
And then Tvia Inc (TVIA) down $2.06, huge percentage drop. The company cut its fourth quarter - I should say forecast for the second quarter, revenues of $5 all the way down to $350,000.
And then finally we see Novatel Wireless (NVTL) losing $2.07. ThinkEquity brokerage downgraded it from "buy" to "accumulate."
Those are the stocks in the news tonight.
