Paul Kangas' Stocks In The News
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
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PAUL KANGAS: It was downhill right from the start of trading, but that big drop just before 3:00 p.m., sending the Dow down almost 550 points, was massive. Dow Jones says the huge volume on the sell-off all day forced it to switch to a backup computer server at around 2:00 p.m. That, in turn, caused tabulation delays and eventually, that huge and sudden drop. When the smoke cleared, volume on the big board was 2.4 billion shares. So, after 47 months of trading without a major correction, the Dow Jones Industrial Average finally closed down 416.02 at 12,216.24. The NASDAQ Composite ended off 96.66 points at 2,407.86. Standard & Poor's 500 Index lost 50.33 at 1,399.04. Over in the bond market a rally, the 10- year note surged 31/32 to par and 29/32, putting the yield down to 4.51 percent.
The most active issue on the big board was General Electric (GE) trading 31.8 million shares, the stock down only $0.68. What might have helped to stabilize it was UBS financial upgraded it from "neutral" to "buy" and boosted the price target on GE from $40 to $45 a share.
Ford Motor Co (F) lost $0.48. The company says its February sales are likely to be down 10 to 15 percent.
Pfizer (PFE) in there with a $0.70 loss.
ExxonMobil (XOM), the biggest point size loser in the Dow Industrial Average and they were all down incidentally, off $3.57 there.
Time Warner (TWX), fifth in volume, fell $0.89 a share.
AT&T (T) off $1.35.
Bank of America (BAC) down nearly $2.
And then Citigroup (C) off $2.08.
Advanced Micro (AMD) fell $0.60. That stock was up nearly $1 yesterday on vague takeover speculation, but today the FTN Midwest brokerage downgraded it from "buy" to "neutral."
JPMorgan Chase (JPM) down $1.59, another Dow stock on the downside.
Let's have some of the other big losers in the Dow Industrial Average. Procter & Gamble (PG), Altria Group (MO), IBM (IBM), Caterpillar (CAT) and Disney (DIS) some of the bigger point size losers in the Dow.
But some of the Chinese ADRs were really hard hit. Look at those losses, a $42 stock down over $8 and so on it goes down the list.
China East Air (CFA)
Trina Solar ltd (TSL)
China Yuchai (CYD)
Yanzhou ADR (YZC)
Aluminum China (AGM) really hard it, the whole group.
L. B. Foster (FSTR) that is a stock we'll get to a little bit later on NASDAQ, but in any case, the Federal Railroad Administration rejected the company's application for a $2.3 billion loan to repair railroad tracks in three states. The Dakota, Minnesota and Eastern railroad is 13 percent owned by L.B. Foster.
Now let's get back on the big board, NYSE Group (NYX) off $5.56. JPMorgan downgraded it from "neutral" to "under weight" and the float will increase coming up as the March lock up on restricted stock expires, so there will be more shares to divide those earnings.
Radioshack (RSH), one of the two good gainers, up $2.68. Fourth quarter earnings jumped to $0.62 from $0.38 a year ago, $0.19 better than the Street expected.
We saw Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea (GAP) rise $2.30, against the tide. The company confirmed it's in merger talks with Pathmark Stores.
And then Federated Department Stores (FD) down $0.85 despite higher fourth quarter earnings excluding items, $1.66, $0.08 above the Street estimate.
And then Harley-Davidson (HOG) off $2.39. The company cut the targets for shipments and earnings growth due to the three-week strike at its York, Pennsylvania plant.
And then the Canadian auto parts maker, Magna Intl (MGA) off $4.55. Fourth quarter earnings excluding items $0.99, $0.18 below the Street estimate. The company slashed its quarterly dividend from $0.38 to $0.19, $0.15 or 50 percent drop.
Google (GOOG) was hard hit today, off $16.16.
Apple (AAPL) down $4.72.
And then Microsoft (MSFT) fell $1.20.
Cisco Systems (CSCO) $1.53 loss.
Intel (INTC) fell $0.82. That was fifth in dollar volume on NASDAQ.
Research in Motion (RIMM) off just over $8. It was up $6 yesterday.
Qualcomm (QCOM) off $2.40.
Amgen (AMGN) fell $1.95.
Yahoo! (YHOO) off $1.17.
And Marvell Tech Group (MRVL) up $0.60. Fourth quarter preliminary revenues for Marvell are up 27 percent.
And those are the stocks in the news tonight.
