Paul Kangas Stocks in the News
Friday, June 12, 2009
|
|
|
|
PAUL KANGAS: Wall Street opened with a sell-off as profit takers sent oil, metal and other commodity stocks lower. The Dow fell 51 points at the outset of trading, while the NASDAQ lost 26 points. The tech stocks were undermined by a fourth quarter loss at National Semiconductor. But because the downturn was relatively mild, buyers returned in the belief the path of least resistance was higher. That turned out to be the case for the blue chips. The Dow closed up 28.34 at 8,799.26 and that was enough to turn it into positive ground on the year. For the week, the Dow rose in three of the last five sessions for an overall advance of 36.13 points. The NASDAQ fell 3.57 to 1,858.80 today. On the week, it rose twice and fell three times, had an overall gain of 9.38. The Standard & Poor's 500 was up 1.32 closing at 946.21 today. For the week, it tacked on 6.12 points overall. Over in the bond market, the 10-year note rose 15/32 to 94 14/32, putting the yield at 3.80 percent.
Big board volume leader on 37.6 million shares, Bank of America (BAC) moving up $0.75. The Stiefel Nicholas brokerage boosted its price target from $18 to $22 a share in the belief the company will repay its TARP by early next year.
Citigroup (C) lost a penny.
And so did Marshall & Ilsley (MI). Marshall & Ilsley after the close yesterday priced and sold 87 million of its shares at $5.75 each.
Ameriprise Financial (AMP) down $1.37. Yesterday, the company priced 36 million of its common shares at $25.
Pfizer (PFE) in there with a $0.13 gain.
Sprint Nextel (S) up $0.21.
Vale (VALE) $0.77 loss there.
And Ford Motor Co (F) dropped $0.13.
General Electric (GE) a nickel gainer. Ford Motor was up $0.13 I should say.
And American Intl Group (AIG) no change.
Novartis Ag (NVS), the big drug company, up $1.66. The company said it successfully completed the production of its first batch of H1N1 flu vaccine weeks ahead of expectations, good news there.
And then Baxter International (BAX) up $1.66. That company said full production of its flu vaccine will be ready by early July.
Clorox Co (CLX) up $2.74. Yesterday the company boosted its dividend by 9 percent. Today, Oppenheimer upgraded it from "under perform" to "out perform" on the company's upbeat outlook for 2010.
Hartford Financial (HIG) down $1.13. It began a $750 million offering of common stock today. The company also is participating in TARP.
Alaska Air Group (ALK) up $0.78. The company plans to buy $50 million worth of its own common stock.
Solera Holdings (SLH) up $1.51. The company's in the auto insurance software business and got an upgrade from Needham securities from "hold" to a "buy."
Then Vulcan Materials (VMC) rebounding $4.50 after a loss yesterday when the company cut its quarterly dividend from $0.49 to only $0.25 and priced an 11.5 million share stock offering at $41 a share. Looks like it was well received.
Cabot (CBT) down $2.29. JPMorgan issued an "under perform" rating in the belief the company will have to cut its $0.72 annual dividend due to poor market conditions.
National Semiconductor (NSM) lost $0.88 after reporting a fourth quarter loss of $0.28 a share. Sales plummeted 39 percent. Goldman Sachs repeated a "sell."
Apple (AAPL) topped the NASDAQ actives, down $2.98.
Research in Motion (RIMM) off $2.42.
Google (GOOG) fell $4.16.
Microsoft (MSFT) bucked the trend, up $0.50.
Cisco Systems (CSCO) a $0.19 loss there.
Intel (INTC) $0.04 drop.
Baidu (BIDU) down $11.69.
Qualcomm (QCOM) gained $0.07.
And then Amazon.com (AMZN) off $1.61. Amazon said it'll pay $51 million to settle a legal dispute with Toys R Us.
Then Oracle (ORCL), tenth in volume, dropped $0.09.
In other trading, Savient Pharmaceuticals (SVNT) up $3.33, big percentage move. The FDA says the company's gout treatment is effective in two recent studies, but there are still some issues about it.
And those are the stocks in the news tonight.
