Paul Kangas' Stocks in the News
Friday, December 19, 2008
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PAUL KANGAS: Wall Street revved up at the open on that auto bailout news, but the blue chips eventually stalled out. The Dow jumped 156 points in the first hour of trading with the NASDAQ up 38 points. The rally started to lose its luster as some investors doubted that the rescue plan would work. By noon the Dow was up only six points and then stocks turned mixed this afternoon with the blue chips posting losses from selling linked to today's quadruple expiration of stock futures and options. The Dow Industrial Average closed off 25.88 at 8579.11. This week, it rose only one time for a net loss overall of 50.57 points. The NASDAQ Composite gained 11.95 points to 1564.32 today. It rose twice and fell three times this week and added 23.60 points overall. Standard & Poor's 500 rose 2.60 to 887.88 today and for the week, it was up 8.15 points. Over in the bond market, the 10-year note fell 21/32 to 114 13/32, putting the yield at 2.13 percent.
New York exchange volume leader on 53.3 million shares, General Electric (GE) moving up $0.54. Standard & Poor's yesterday said the company could lose its AAA credit rating. The company stressed that it is safe.
Citigroup (C) down $0.41.
Ford Motor Co (F) moved up $0.11.
And then Wells Fargo (WFC) $0.29 drop.
ExxonMobil (XOM) was off $1.98.
Incidentally, GM stock was up $0.83 to $4.9 today, a 23 percent gain.
Bank of America (BAC) down $0.16.
Pfizer (PFE) an $0.18 loss.
JPMorgan Chase (JPM) up $0.11.
AT&T (T) a $0.40 advance there.
And Time Warner (TWX), tenth in volume, was down $0.16.
Accenture Ltd (ACN), the big consulting firm, up $1.80 on higher first quarter earnings of $0.74 versus $0.60 last year. Revenues up 6 percent. Standard & Poor's and Deutsche Bank brokerages both repeated "buys," even though the company cut its 2009 earnings outlook.
Fluor (FLR), the big engineering construction firm, down $2.79. Citigroup downgraded it from "hold" to "sell" because of the poor credit market conditions which is delaying construction projects.
Another big firm, Weyerhaeuser Co (WY) off $3.54. The company said the housing slump will result in significantly lower fourth quarter earnings. It's going to cut its dividend by 58 percent. It'll go from $0.60 to $0.25 quarterly, but the company will buy back up to $250 million of its own stock.
Gardner Denver (GDI), which makes compressors and things like that, down $1.44. The company sees 2008 earnings, $3 to $3.04, well down from the previous forecast from the company of $3.29 to $3.35. It's going to cut its global workforce also by 9 percent.
Intrepid Potash (IPI), the fertilizer firm, off $1.44. The company sees fourth quarter sales less than half of third quarter levels due to low potash demand.
And then Southwestern Energy (SWN) up $2.81. Surprisingly, this company is ramping up its oil production at oil shale operations.
Then Darden Restaurants (DRI) had a great day, up $4.57. Second quarter earnings jumped to $0.42 from $0.30 a year ago. Sales up 9.6 percent. Standard & Poor's however downgraded the stock from "buy" to "hold" on a valuation basis.
Circor International (CIR) which is into fluid control products, things like that, is going to have its stock added to the Standard & Poor's small cap 600 on a date to be announced.
And then another restaurant chain doing well today, Brinker International (EAT) up $2.58. The company closed the sale of an 80 percent stake in Romano's Macaroni Grill.
NASDAQ's most active, Apple (AAPL) up $0.57.
Research in Motion (RIMM) up $4.39. After the close yesterday, better than expected third quarter earnings out.
Microsoft (MSFT) an $0.18 loss.
Google (GOOG) down $0.11.
And Oracle (ORCL) up $1.17. After the close yesterday, it also had better than expected second quarter earnings out. Today, Standard & Poor's repeated a "buy." Cisco Systems (CSCO) $0.02 loss.
Intel (INTC) $0.18 gain.
First Solar (FSLR) up $2.80.
Qualcomm (QCOM) gained $0.91.
And Gilead Sciences (GILD) rose $0.87 a share.
Elsewhere, Provident Bankshares (PBKS) jumping almost 61 percent with that gain of $3.53. M&T Bancorp will acquire the company for stock worth about $9.50 a share. M&T Bancorp stock was down $3.76 at $55.96.
Those are the stocks in the news tonight.
