Paul Kangas' Stocks in the News
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
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PAUL KANGAS: Hopes for an auto rescue plan helped stocks open with a nice rebound from yesterday's sell off. An hour into trading the Dow was up 132 points with the NASDAQ 26 points higher. The rally ran into resistance after the auto bailout plan came under increasing criticism at midday. By 2:30 this afternoon, the Dow was down 31 points, but then some late buy programs put stocks back in the black at the closing bell. The Dow Industrial Average ended the day up 70.09 at 8761.42. The NASDAQ Composite was up 18.14 to 1565.48. Standard & Poor's 500 Index rose 10.57 ending at 899.24. In the bond market, the 10-year note lost 14/32 to 109 4/32, putting the yield up to 2.70 percent.
Big board volume leader on 23.3 million shares, General Electric (GE) moving up $0.22, even though UBS financial downgraded it from "buy" to "neutral."
Citigroup (C) $0.24 loss there.
Ford Motor (F) edged $0.02 higher.
Bank of America (BAC) a $0.26 loss.
And Co Vale do Rio (RIO) did well today, up $1.22.
XL Capital (XL), very active and all over the place. It traded as low as $2.83 and the high of the day was $7.32. Bloomberg reported that Bermuda-based insurer has hired Goldman Sachs to help explore the sale of the company and it still closed down rather sharply.
ExxonMobil (XOM) rising $1.87.
Wells Fargo (WFC) $1.31 loss, CEO Of Wells things the housing market may be in the bottoming process, but meanwhile, Atlantic Equity brokerage downgraded the stock from "over weight" to just "neutral."
Petrobras (PBR) up $2.63.
Tenth in volume, JPMorgan Chase (JPM) with a $0.44 loss.
American International Group (AIG) losing another $0.18. "The Wall Street Journal" reports the company owes investment banks about $10 billion for trades that went bad.
American Express (AXP) down $1.73 today. Citigroup started coverage of the stock with a "sell" and so did Bank of America. Other credit card stocks like Mastercard and Visa also edged lower.
Caterpillar (CAT) moved up $1.29. Standard & Poor's upgraded it from "hold" to a "strong buy" on the outlook for an increase in global infrastructure spending starting next year.
Nike (NKE) down $2.44. Bank of America downgraded it from "buy" to a "neutral."
Look at this gain, 223 percent with an $8.70 advance. This is a real estate investment trust and a private equity firm called Green Court Partners will acquire it for $14.20 a share, what a move. American Land Lease (ANL)
Rio Tinito (RTP) moving up $21.41. Due to the weak 2009 outlook, the company is cutting its capital expenditures from $9 billion to $4 billion and it will also cut about 14,000 jobs. Standard & Poor's upgraded the stock from "sell" to a "buy."
AO Smith (AOS) down $2.39, makes water heaters and electric motors, stuff like that. The company sees 2008 earnings at $2.73 at best and that's versus its previous estimate of $2.90. Standard & Poor's downgraded it from "buy" to just a "hold."
And then came gold, gold in New York, the February contract $808.80 an ounce, up $34.60 the ounce. Anglogold Ashanti (AU), Barrick Gold (ABX), Freeport McMoran Copper (FCX), Kinross Gold (KGC) and Newmont Mining (NEM) all sizeable gainers today.
NASDAQ's most active, Apple (AAPL) down $1.85. Morgan Stanley cut its price target from $1.05 down to $95 a share.
Google (GOOG) in there, up $2.85.
A penny gain in Microsoft (MSFT).
Intel (INTC) a $0.03 loss.
Cisco (CSCO) moved up $0.17.
Moving along, Electronic Arts (ERTS) down $2.35 after a $2.52 loss yesterday when it cut 2009 earnings and revenues and Standard & Poor's today repeated a "sell." Citigroup downgraded it from "buy" to just a "hold."
Qualcomm (QCOM) up $0.99.
Research in Motion (RIMM) down $0.78.
Oracle (ORCL) $0.45 advance.
And Dryships (DRYS) continues to move higher. The bulk carrier did very well this week so far, up $1.26.
Powell (POWL), which is into electronic products, up $5.03. Fourth quarter earnings, $0.72, way up from $0.22 a year ago.
And then we see Teletech (TTEC) off $1.76. Stiefel brokerage downgraded it from "buy" to just a "hold."
And those are the stocks in the news tonight.
