Paul Kangas' Stocks in the News
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
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PAUL KANGAS: Plagued by growing recession worries, stocks on Wall Street failed to stage even a technical rebound from yesterday's battering. A rise in December consumer prices and Intel's after-the bell earnings shortfall we told you about yesterday kept sellers very active as the Dow fell 95 points by 11:00 a.m. with the NASDAQ off 48 points. After see- sawing for a few hours, the Dow rallied to a 75 point gain on some bargain buying, but a late sell off sent stocks lower by the final bell. The Dow Industrial Average closed off 34.95 at 12,466.16. The NASDAQ Composite ended down exactly 23 points at 2394.59. Standard & Poor's 500 down 7 3/4 points at 1373.20. In the bond market, the 10-year note fell 16/32 to 104 5/32, putting the yield at 3.74 percent.
Once again at the top of the active list today on 50 million shares, Citigroup (C) down another $0.70. General Electric (GE) in there with a $0.03 gain. GE's earnings are due out this Friday.
JPMorgan Chase (JPM), the star of the Dow today, up $2.26. Fourth quarter earnings were lower, $0.86 versus $1.26 last year, but the company's market capitalization with this gain today has now overtaken that of Citigroup's. Incidentally, Bear Stearns upgraded the financial sector today from "under weight" to "market weight" and that helped a lot of the bank stocks.
Pfizer (PFE) down $0.19.
Ford Motor Co (F) dropped $0.11.
Then we see EMC Corp (EMC) moving up $0.12.
Advanced Micro (AMD) $0.45 gain.
Bank of America (BAC) edged up $0.81.
And then we see Co Vale do Rio (RIO), that's the Brazilian mining firm, down $2.05. The company canceled 5 million tons of iron ore shipments to China in the first quarter after a December accident at one of its main terminals.
AT&T (T) a $0.24 gainer, tenth in big board volume.
Wells Fargo & Co (WFC), another financial stock with a gain today, $0.88. Fourth quarter earnings dropped to $0.41 versus $0.64 a year ago, but that was in line with Street estimates, so the stock did all right.
Ambac Financial Group (ABK) didn't, down $8.17, a lot of bad news today. The company sees a fourth quarter loss of up to $33 a share. It's cutting its quarterly dividend by 67 percent from $0.21 to $0.07 and then it's going to have to raise a $1 billion in capital. Standard & Poor's downgraded the stock from "hold" to "sell." MBIA, one of the company's rivals in the bond insurance business, dropped $2.65 in sympathy to $13.40 a share.
MGM Mirage (MGM) moving up $4.10. The company and Dubai World have increased their plan to buy 10 million shares at $80, all the way up to 15 million shares at a price of $80 a share.
Mattel (MAT) up $1.34. Needham Securities upgraded it from "hold" to a "strong buy."
Then Metlife (MET) doing all right, up $0.79. It traded as high as $61.83. The board has approved a stock buy back of up to a $1 billion for Metlife.
Syniverse Holdings (SVR) up $2.18. The phone service firm sees 2007 revenues as high as $800, $371 million versus the Street estimate of about $364. The company's also upbeat on its outlook for 2008.
Jarden (JAH) up $2.13. The consumer products manufacturer is comfortable with Wall Street earnings estimates in the fourth quarter of $0.73 a share and for the full year of about $2.41 a share.
PFF Bancorp (PFB) tumbling $2.20. The company sees third quarter charge offs of about $55 million on the weakness in the company's residential construction portfolio.
Apple (AAPL) topped the NASDAQ active list, getting hit for a $9.40 loss.
Google (GOOG) down $21.70.
Intel (INTC) down $2.81 after last night's disappointing earnings.
Microsoft (MSFT) $0.77 drop.
BEA Systems (BEA) up $2.88. The company had now approved Oracle's sweetened takeover bid of $19.37, up from $17 originally.
Research in Motion (RIMM) down $1.63.
Baidu.com (BIDU) fell almost $25.
Cisco Systems (CSCO) a $0.70 drop.
First Solar (FSLR) up $23 - down $23.23.
And then Oracle (ORCL), tenth in volume, up $0.61 and a positive reaction to BEA's approving its takeover bid.
Knight Capital Group (NITE), $2.43 gain, nice move there. Fourth quarter earnings, higher, $0.52 versus only $0.45 last year.
And then Scientific Games (SGMS) tumbling $8.70. The lottery operator was downgraded by Morgan Stanley from "over weight" to "under weight" due to increasing competition from Getech Corporation.
Those are the stocks in the news tonight.
