Paul Kangas' Stocks in the News
Thursday, October 30, 2008
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PAUL KANGAS: Wall Street viewed that decline in GDP as smaller than feared and responded with a sharp opening rally with the Dow shooting up nearly 200 points and the NASDAQ adding 42 points. Most of that advance faded by mid-day on word firms like American Express, Hartford Financial and Avon Products reported disappointing results or earnings warnings. Afternoon brought renewed strength though amid signs the credit markets are thawing out and stocks went on to end near the day's best levels. The Dow Industrial Average closed up 189.73 points at 9180.69. The NASDAQ Composite was up 41.31 at 1698.52 while Standard & Poor's 500 rose exactly 24 points at 954.09. Over in the bond market, the 10-year note lost 27/32 to par and 9/32, putting the yield at 3.97 percent.
Big board volume leader on 20.4 million shares, Wachovia (WB) moving down $0.06.
Followed by Pfizer (PFE) $0.67 gain.
General Electric (GE) up $0.15.
And then ExxonMobil (XOM) with a $0.04 closing gain, but it traded as low as $71.46 today even though it reported record third quarter earnings of $2.86 a share, up 58 percent from last year and that translates into a record $14.8 billion, the biggest quarterly profit in history ever.
Citigroup (C) $0.36 advance there.
Moving along in the actives, National City (NCC) a $0.09 gain.
MGIC Investment (MTG) fell $0.56.
Co Vale do Rio (RIO) was an $0.84 gainer.
Bank of America (BAC) rose $0.46.
JPMorgan Chase (JPM) gaining $1.91.
Hartford Financial (HIG) tumbling $10.24, losing almost 52 percent of its value after reporting a big third quarter loss of $1.40 a share versus earnings of over $3 last year. Standard & Poor's today repeated a "sell" recommendation on Hartford.
Avon Products (AVP) losing $4.10 despite third quarter earnings nicely higher, $0.52 versus $0.32 a year ago, but the company sees sales and earnings deteriorating in the fourth quarter and along with lower profit margins, so that's what got the stock down.
Colgate Palmolive (CL) doing nicely, up $4.23. Third quarter earnings higher, $0.99 versus $0.86 a year ago. Sales were up 13 percent during the period.
CVS Caremark (CVS) up $3.01. Third quarter earnings rose to $0.60 from $0.50 a year ago. Revenues gained 2 percent and today the company closed its acquisition of Longs drug store. Standard & Poor's repeated a "strong buy" on CVS stock.
Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) rising $25.21. Third quarter earnings rose to $1.04 from last year's $0.93. Revenues jumped 33 percent. The company agreed to buy the Clearing Corporation and form a new ventured called ICE U.S. Trust.
Visa (V), the credit card company, up $3.56. Third quarter earnings of $0.58 versus a loss of over $2 last year. Those earnings $0.02 above the Street estimate.
Owens-Illinois (OI), which makes packaging materials and things like that, up $4.11. Third quarter earnings rose to $0.90 from $0.78 a year ago. Revenues up 4 percent in that period.
Diebold (DBD), makes ATMs and things like that, up $3.54. Third quarter earnings up 65 percent to $0.70 a share. That was $0.06 better than the Street was expecting.
And Assurant (AIZ) tumbling $8.42. The company's in the homeowners' insurance business. It had a third quarter loss of $0.95 a share versus earnings of $1.56. Revenues dropped 9 percent in the period.
A nice gain by Genco Shipping (GNK), up $3.04. Third quarter earnings rose to $1.99 from $0.64 last year and the company says 93 percent of its fleet is on contract for the rest of the year, 60 so far for the year 2009.
NASDAQ's most active, Apple (AAPL) up $6.49.
Followed by Google (GOOG) up $1.69.
Intel (INTC), $1.23 gain, nice move there.
Microsoft (MSFT) fell $0.37.
And Oracle (ORCL) up $1.03.
Cisco Systems (CSCO) down $0.08.
$0.43 drop in Research in Motion (RIMM).
First Solar (FSLR), look at that gain, up $28.32. Third quarter earnings jumped to $1.20 versus only $0.58 last year, $0.19 better than the Street was expecting.
Qualcomm (QCOM) up $1.80.
Amazon.com (AMZN) was down $0.18.
Symantec (SYMC), which is in IT security, down $2.62. Second quarter earnings, $0.16, up from $0.06 a year ago, but it sees third quarter earnings at $0.33, $0.04 below the Street estimate.
And those are the stocks in the news tonight.
