Paul Kangas' Stocks in the News
Friday, October 30, 2009
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PAUL KANGAS: Stocks opened with a computer glitch at the New York Stock Exchange as a heavy influx of orders caused opening delays on some quotes. But it didn't take long to see most of those orders were on the sell side, sending the Dow down 80 points in the first hour of trading, with the NASDAQ off 12 points. The selling grew much worse during midday when several big futures-related sell programs kicked in as some indices broke below their support levels. End-of-month portfolio shuffling added to today's volatility and stocks went on to end near their worst levels of the day. The Dow Industrial Average tumbled 249.85 points to 9712.73. This week, it rose twice, but fell three times, had a net loss of 259.45 points. The NASDAQ Composite fell 52.44, ending at 2,045.11 today. It fell four times this week for a net loss of 109.36 points. Standard & Poor's 500 lost 29.93 today and for the week was down 43.41 points. Over in the bond market, the 10-year note rose 29/32 to 101 31/32, putting the yield at 3.39 percent.
Big board volume leader on nearly 89 million shares was Citigroup (C) losing $0.22. Accounting expert Robert Willins (ph) said the bank is likely to have a big $10 billion fourth quarter charge on its deferred cash assets. A company spokesman said he was puzzled by that observation.
Bank of America (BAC) down $1.15. That was the biggest percentage loser in the Dow Industrial 30. There were no gainers in that average.
General Electric (GE) $0.61 drop there.
CIT Group (CIT) off $0.23. Carl Icahn is in a truce with the company. He now backs the company's prepackaged bankruptcy plan.
Pfizer (PFE) a $0.52 loss.
And as this blizzard of minus signs continues, Wells Fargo (WFC) losing $1.05.
AT&T (T) down $0.56.
Ford Motor Co (F) a $0.30 drop.
JPMorgan Chase (JPM) down $2.58. But Las Vegas Sands (LVS) managed to come in a winner, up $0.33. Standard & Poor's raised its price target by $2 to $17 a share.
Metlife (MET) down $2.81. Third quarter operating earnings were higher, $0.97 versus last year's $0.84, but the company said it may have to inject capital into its life insurance business and it's also cautious on the outlook.
Cummins (CMI) down $2.86. Third quarter earnings fell to $0.48 from $1.17 last year. Sales fell 31 percent and the company sees a challenging year ahead.
Harman International (HAR), which makes high quality audio equipment, up $4.61. First quarter loss of only $0.05. The Street was looking for $0.23 loss.
CEC Entertainment (CEC) up $3.88. This is the parent of Chuckie Cheese restaurants and it had nicely higher third quarter earnings of $0.55, up from $0.43 a year ago and the board has approved a $200 million stock buyback.
The big jewelry chain Zale (ZLC) losing $1.66 or nearly 26 percent of its value. The company posted a fourth quarter loss of $2.81 versus a loss of only $0.30 last year and get this, the SEC is launching a probe into the company's accounting practices.
Estee Lauder (EL) $1.36 gainer. First quarter earnings, $0.71, way up from $0.26 last year.
Manitowoc Co (MTW) $1.31 loss, big percentage drop there. The company had earnings in the third quarter of $0.04 and that was $0.04 below the Wall Street estimate and way down from $0.71 last year. Nevertheless, Standard & Poor's repeated a "strong buy" on Manitowoc.
Stanley (SXE), this is an IT services firm, second quarter earnings higher, $0.49 versus $0.37 a year ago, $0.07 better than expected and Wells Fargo upgraded it from "market perform" to "out perform."
Apple (AAPL) topped the NASDAQ's most active, down $7.85, got hit by selling.
Microsoft (MSFT) down $0.49.
Google (GOOG) off nearly $15 a share.
Intel (INTC) $0.11 loss there.
Amazon.com (AMZN) down $3.77.
And the red marks continue, Cisco Systems (CSCO) down $0.71.
Research in Motion (RIMM) losing $2.63.
Baidu (BIDU) $15.48 loss.
Qualcomm (QCOM) down $0.94.
And Oracle (ORCL) fell $0.35.
In other NASDAQ trading, MicroStrategy (MSTR) bucked the trend, up $13.83 or almost 19 percent after reporting third quarter earnings of $1.73. The Street was expecting earnings of only $0.94, so much better than expected.
On the downside however, Novatel Wireless (NVTL) losing $3.27. Third quarter earnings came in at $0.20, $0.10 better than expected, but the company's forecasting fourth quarter revenues will be below Street estimates and that's what hurt the stock.
And those are the stocks in the news tonight.
