Paul Kangas' Stocks in the News
Monday, December 08, 2008
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PAUL KANGAS: Hopes for that auto bailout and the Obama infrastructure plan, which we`ll detail next, lit a fire under Wall Street this morning. Ninety minutes into the trading day, the Dow posted a towering 337 point gain with the NASDAQ up 53 points. Stocks eased back a bit at mid-session, but bargain hunters were very active and that helped the market come back and close near its best level of the day. The Dow Industrial Average vaulted 298.76 points at 8934.18. The NASDAQ was up 62.43 points ending at 1571.74. Standard & Poor`s 500 up 33.63 ending at 909.70. Over in the bond market, the 10-year note lost 7/32 to 108 25/32, putting the yield at 2.74 percent.
Most active big board issue on 33 million shares was Ford Motor Co (F) moving up $0.66. That`s a 24.3 percent advance and of course hopes are alive it`ll be saved by the auto rescue plan.
Citigroup (C) in there with a $0.76 gain.
General Electric (GE) $1.03 on the upside.
Bank of America (BAC) was up $2.60 now that it`s acquired Merrill Lynch.
Let`s have a look a Merrill Lynch (MER) chart, up $2.22 today. Merrill`s CEO John Thain, who reportedly asked for a 2008 bonus of $5 to $10 million, now says he`ll forego any bonus because of the fallout on Wall Street.
Back to the active list, we see JPMorgan Chase (JPM) up $3.14.
Wells Fargo (WFC) gained $2.72 in the strong banking group.
ExxonMobil (XOM) did well, up $3 a share.
Mitsubishi UFJ (MTU) a $0.03 gain.
Pfizer (PFE) was up $0.38.
And Co Vale do Rio (RIO) an $0.85 advance there, tenth in volume.
Alcoa (AA) gained $1.43, a gain of 17 1/2 percent as a matter of fact and the Obama infrastructure plan according to analysts could boost demand for aluminum considerably.
Disney (DIS) was up $2.15. It`s going to acquire Jetx. That`s a European kids entertainment firm. The price: 11 euros per share.
And then General Motors (GM) up $0.85, almost a 21 percent advance on hopes it`ll be saved by the auto rescue plan.
And then McDonald`s (MCD) losing $1.80. Global November sales for McDonalds were up 7.7 percent. Same store sales in the U.S. up 4.5 percent, but the stock is down, most likely on concerns the stronger dollar could hurt foreign sales.
3M Co (MMM), another Dow stock on the downside, losing $2.47. The company cut its 2008 earnings guidance from a high of $5.48 down to $5.15 a share at best, sees 2009 earnings at $4.95 at best.
Dow Chemical (DOW) $1.37 gain there. The company is cutting 5,000 jobs to save money. That`s 11 percent of its workforce and it`s also closing 20 plants.
Chesapeake Energy (CHK), the big natural gas producer, up $2.76. The company is going to rein in costs and raise $4 billion over the next two years through asset sales. That will avoid any equity offerings and earnings dilution.
The steel stocks were very strong today after Goldman Sachs said huge cuts in steel production will push prices higher before long. AK Steel (AKS), Arcelor Mittal (MT), Nucor (NUE) and look at that gain in US Steel (X), up $7.03.
NYSE Euronext (NYX) up $4.82. The rumor making the rounds, the company may have talked merger with Deutsche Borse, maybe as recently as this past weekend. It also reported its November U.S. cash products average daily volume was up 26 percent over a year ago.
Apple (AAPL) topped the active list on NASDAQ, moving up $5.72 on reports it`s popular iPhone will soon be sold in Wal-Mart stores.
Google (GOOG) up $18.12. It`s in a pact with a salesforce.com to make their platform for developers more compatible and more competitive for Microsoft.
And Microsoft (MSFT) itself up $1.14.
Cisco Systems (CSCO) up $1.31.
Intel (INTC) $0.65 advance there.
Qualcomm (QCOM) gained $1.63.
Research in Motion (RIMM) up $1.36.
Look at these gains, Baidu.com (BIDU) up $8.85.
Oracle (ORCL) $0.72 advance.
And First Solar (FSLR) up $6.30.
One of the strongest groups today is the bulk carriers and let`s have a look at that group if we can. Diana Shipping (DSX), Dryships (DRYS), Excel Maritime (EXM) and Genco Shipping (GNK) huge percent moves.
And speaking of carriers, Fedex (FDX) closed up $0.72, but after the close, the stock fell below $66 a share when the company issued a 2009 profit warning.
And those are the stocks in the news.
