Paul Kangas' Stocks in the News
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
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PAUL KANGAS: Wall Street opened with moderate gains as buyers hunted for bargains after last week's sharp losses. A stronger dollar added to bullish confidence. After an hour of trading, the Dow was up 45 points and the NASDAQ had a 23 point gain. The market faded a bit over the midday hours, but came on strong with the tech stocks leading the way in early afternoon. That as investors reacted to the sharp decline in oil and other commodity futures. The Dow Industrial Average went on to close up 68.72 at 12,548.35. The NASDAQ Composite was up 36.57 ending at 2,481.24. Standard & Poor's 500 Index rose 9.42 to 1,385.35. Over in the bond market, the 10- year note fell 19/32 to 99 19/32, putting the yield at 3.92 percent.
Familiar name at the top of the active board, Citigroup (C) on 18.5 million shares topped it, up $0.54 today.
That was followed by General Electric (GE) with a $0.03 drop. GE wants to sell its appliance unit and it seems there are a lot of foreign buyers that might be interested.
Ford Motor (F) dropped $0.07 a share. The Citigroup made some rather bearish comments about the auto industry today.
Pfizer (PFE) down $0.20.
And then came Wells Fargo (WFC) with a $0.12 drop there.
Moving along in the active list, Fannie Mae (FNM) fell $1.06.0
Bank of America (BAC) up $0.24.
JPMmorgan Chase (JPM) gained $0.69. JPMorgan Chase and First Data Corp. have agreed to end their joint venture called Chase Payment Tech Solutions. They hope to do it by the end of this year.
General Motors (GM) down $0.18. Citigroup downgraded GM from "buy" to just a "hold."
And then ExxonMobil (XOM) on those lower oil prices today, losing $0.90.
UBS Ag (UBS), the big financial bank, down $1.56. "Wall Street Journal" reported the company warned it may have to record losses on non- U.S. real estate as it sells some $16 billion to shareholders in an attempt to repair the company's rather damaged balance sheet.
Hershey (HSY) big gainer, up $3.42. Takeover speculation with a possible joint venture maybe with Nestle, just speculation.
Valero Energy (VLO), the big refining company, down $1.14. The company had to shut down a key gasoline unit at its New Jersey refinery due to a leak. We didn't need that on this atmosphere.
Standard Pacific (SPR), the western home builder, up $1.07, big percentage move. A private equity firm called Matlin Patterson will invest $530 million in various company securities for some much-needed cash by Standard Pacific.
Polaris Industries (PI) which makes ATVs and snowmobiles, things like that, got an upgrade from FTN Midwest Securities, an upgrade from "sell" to "neutral."
And Baker Hughes (BHI), the big oil company, oil service company, up $2.01. Merrill Lynch upgraded it from "neutral" to "buy." Merrill Lynch gave the same upgrade to Darden Restaurants (DRI), "neutral" to "buy."
On the downside we see Flotek Industries (FTK) losing $1.91. The company cut its 2008 earnings forecast, which was $1.50 to $1.60 a share down to $1.12 to $1.22 because of lower than expected first quarter performance.
Pediatrix Medical (PDX) dropping $5.15. The company sees lower than expected second quarter earnings of $0.77 to $0.80 and it will not meet its full year forecast because of lower than expected patient volume at its neonatal intensive care unit, but the company will buy back to up $100 million of its stock.
Apple (AAPL) topped NASDAQ's active, up $5.26. It's in a pact to sell its iPhone in Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Finland.
Research in Motion (RIMM) up $3.49.
Followed by Google (GOOG) with a nice gain of $16.28.
Then Microsoft (MSFT) $0.39 advance.
Intel (INTC) up $0.19 even though the "Financial Times" reported the EU competition authority plans to take action against the company's sales and distribution practices.
Baidu.com (BIDU) up $7.79.
Qualcomm (QCOM) $1.09 gainer.
Cisco Systems (CSCO) up $0.49.
First Solar (FSLR) dropped $13.32.
Then Amazon.com (AMZN) with a gain of $2.27.
Consolidated Communications (CNSL) up $1.16. Credit Suisse upgraded it from "neutral" to "outperform."
And those are the stocks in the news tonight.
