Paul Kangas' Stocks in the News
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
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PAUL KANGAS: Stocks on Wall Street opened lower, partly due to that overnight sell off in the Shanghai market. The Dow fell just 40 points however and the NASDAQ lost just nine in the early going. That resistance to selling bolstered bullish conviction so by midday the Dow snapped back with a 35-point gain and the NASDAQ was up 4. After a brief dip, stocks rallied sharply on that release of minutes from the May Federal Reserve meeting. The Dow Industrial Average jumped 111.74 points to a new record high of 13,633.08. The NASDAQ Composite rose 20.53, ending at 2592.59, while the Standard & Poor's 500 finally closed at a record high up 12.12 at 1530.23. Over in the bond market, the 10-year note climbed 4/32 to 97 3/32, putting the yield at 4.87 percent.
Big board volume leader on 16.5 million shares, Pfizer (PFE) losing $0.15.
Followed by EMC Corp (EMC) with a $0.52 gain.
MEMC Electronic (WFR) up $1.01.
First Data Corp (FDC) edged up $0.13. This company's in the process of being acquired by Kohlberg, Kravitz Roberts for $34 a share.
ExxonMobil (XOM) was up $1.38, nice move there.
General Electric (GE) $0.33 gain.
Time Warner (TWX) edged up $0.11.
AT&T (T) $0.49 advance.
Sprint Nextel (S) rose $0.70.
And Kraft Foods (KFT) was up $0.18.
Dow Jones & Co. (DJ) gained $1.02. The "Financial Times" of London reports T. Rowe Price, the largest shareholder outside of the Bancroft family with 15 percent of the stock finds News Corp $60 a share buyout bid fairly attractive.
Pennsylvania Real Estate (PEI) up $3.19 on takeover speculation there. Yesterday the REITs were very strong after Archstone Smith accepted a $60.75 buyout bid from Tishman Speyer. And today that whole group very strong again today. Look at that, five of them, all nice gainers, especially after Deutsche Bank upgraded these particular five from "neutral" to "buy," good gains.
Phillips-Van Heusen (PVH) had a good day, up $4.27. First quarter earnings moved up $0.92 from $0.74 a year ago, $0.06 better than expected. Revenues up 17 percent. The company boosted its 2007 earnings guidance and Bank America repeated a "buy" and boosted its target price to $68 a share, a lot of good news there.
Marathon Oil (MRO) up $3.21. This company plans to boost its stock buyback program by $500 million.
And speaking of that, E.on ag ADS (EON), this is a big German utility. It's going to buy back $9.4 billion of its stock by the end of 2008. It also planned a 20 percent annual dividend boost until the year 2010.
Western Refining (WNR) moving up $2.97 on news that the court has denied the Federal Trade Commission's attempt to block the company's acquisition of Giant Industries. Giant stock edged up just $0.15 on the news.
Nisource Inc Holding (N) down $1.87. The company ended talks to sell its Indiana electricity assets.
And Donaldson Co (DCI), which makes filtration systems, had higher third quarter earnings of $0.49, up from $0.43 a year ago, but it cut the high end full year earnings target and that hurt the stock.
NASDAQ's most active, Apple (AAPL) up $4.42. As you heard, it launched its iTunes plus product and in addition, WR Hambrecht brokerage boosted its target by $10 to $125 for the stock. Morgan Stanley's target now is $150 a share.
Google (GOOG) up $11.49.
Microsoft (MSFT) $0.32 gain, there you see it.
Cisco Systems (CSCO) moved up $0.49.
Qualcomm (QCOM) down $1.32.
Intel (INTC) lost $0.22.
CDW (CDWC) up $2.06. The company will be acquired by Madison Dearborn partners for $87.75 a share.
Biogen Idec (BIID) moving up $2.92. The company began a Dutch tender offer for 57 million shares of its own stock. That's 16 percent of the outstanding and the price will be between $47 and $53 a share.
Research in Motion (RIMM) down $0.67.
Amazon.com (AMZN) edged $0.23 higher.
And finally, Novacea (NOVC) soared nearly $7 on news Schering Plough has agreed to pay up to $440 million for the rights to develop Novacea's experimental prostate cancer treatment.
