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Markets Lower in Wake of Jobs Numbers

September 6, 2013 by

U.S. stocks had a mixed close after volatile trading on Friday, after job market data removed some uncertainty about Federal Reserve policy and after Russian President Vladimir Putin said he would maintain his long-standing support for Syria if the West were to attack.

The Standard Poor’s 500 index gained 0.09 points or 0.01 percent, closing at 1,655.17. The Dow Jones industrial average fell 14.98 points or 0.1 percent, to 14,922.50, and the Nasdaq Composite added 1.23 points or 0.03 percent, closing at 3,660.01.

For the week, the SP 500 is up 1.04 percent and the Nasdaq is up 1.1 percent. The Dow is up 0.6 percent after four weekly declines.

The U.S. August payrolls report showed about 169,000 jobs were added, fewer than the 180,000 that had been expected, and July’s figure was revised sharply lower. The unemployment rate fell to 7.3 percent, its lowest since December 2008, though the decline reflected a drop in the share of working-age Americans who either have a job or are looking for one.

Many analysts said despite the weak jobs report the U.S. central bank would not adjust plans to slow its stimulus, currently at $85 billion a month in bond purchases.

Kansas City Fed President Esther George, a consistent hawk who has argued for a tapering in bond purchases all year, said reducing purchases to $70 billion a month could be “an appropriate next step toward normalizing monetary policy.”

Such a reduction would be in line with expectations that have been falling in the last few months.

“Tapering is going to happen but there is a wide range of opinions in terms of how much the Fed is going to taper,” said Joseph Tanious, global market strategist at JPMorgan Asset Management in New York.

“The market is comfortable with the idea (of winding down stimulus) as it is justified by economic growth,” he said, pointing to recent data including an almost eight year high in the pace of growth in the U.S. services sector.

Investors are continuing to assess the possibility of a U.S.-led strike against Syria in retaliation for an alleged chemical weapons attack against its civilians.

Putin made clear on Friday that Russia did not want to be sucked into a war over Syria, signaling that Moscow would maintain ongoing support to Damascus in the event of foreign military intervention.

Tanious said, getting clarity on Russia’s point of view helps ease some concerns about the implications of an attack on Syria, but any U.S. intervention is likely to impact oil and other markets.

“The (equities) market is jittery and that is understandable,” he said.

Energy prices have been among the most volatile on the issue, with investors concerned that military action in the Middle East will weigh on oil supplies. U.S. crude oil has spiked almost 4 percent over the past two weeks and was up 1.7 percent on Friday.

Facebook shares rose 3 percent to $43.95 after hitting $44.56, its highest since the stock’s debut on Nasdaq more than a year ago.

American Tower Corp rose 4.6 percent to $71.91 after the company agreed to buy Global Tower Partners for $4.8 billion.

E*Trade Financial shares jumped 4.6 percent to $16.26 after Goldman Sachs upgraded the brokerage’s stock to “buy” from “neutral” two days after the company received approval to use capital from its bank subsidiary for broader corporate purposes.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/07/business/daily-stock-market-activity.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Economy News Tagged With: , ,

Wall Street Indexes Close Mixed

July 23, 2013 by Leave a Comment

The Standard Poor’s 500-stock index hit an intraday record high on Tuesday before slipping in a tight-range session, while the Dow Jones industrials got a lift from upbeat earnings.

By the end of trading, the S. P. was 0.2 percent lower, the Dow Jones industrial average gained 0.1 percent and the Nasdaq composite was down 0.6 percent.

The S. P.’s decline was only its second down day in the last 14 for the benchmark index. The SP 500 has gained about 19 percent for the year.

“Valuations are decent, there’s positive monetary pressure, earnings are just O.K.” said John Manley, chief equity strategist at Wells Fargo Funds Management in New York. “It’s hard to get people excited but the market keeps grinding higher.”

“It will be slow over the summer, but the market will have an upward bias,” he said.

Shares of United Technologies, the world’s largest maker of elevators and air conditioners, led the Dow’s advance after the company raised the low end of its 2013 earnings forecast. The stock was up 3 percent.

The Dow also reached an intraday record high shortly after the opening bell, within a few minutes of the SP 500’s jump to its record intraday high.

Asian markets rose after local media outlets in China reported that the government was looking to increase investment in railroad projects to reduce gluts in steel, cement and other materials as it aimed to ensure annual economic growth did not sink below 7 percent.

The reports lifted stocks across Asia outside Japan by 1.3 percent, to their highest levels since early June. They also gave an early increase to mining stocks in London, although a lack of detail made some in the markets cautious.

A flurry of merger and acquisition activity and a sharp rally in telecommunications shares added to gains across Europe in morning trade, but by the end of the session, the FTSEurofirst 300 index was 0.2 percent lower.

Among declining shares in the United States, the online-entertainment company Netflix fell 4.5 percent, a day after it reported that its show “Arrested Development” had lured new subscribers in the second quarter — but not enough to impress investors.

United Parcel Service posted a smaller quarterly profit as customers chose slower, cheaper shipping services, especially on international routes. Its shares were 0.1 percent lower.

Benchmark crude oil in the United States gained 17 cents, to $107.11 a barrel. Investors are awaiting United States crude inventory data for further clues about the outlook for demand.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/24/business/daily-stock-market-activity.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Global Business Tagged With: , ,

Wall Street Sinks After Earnings Data

April 17, 2013 by Leave a Comment

Apple Inc slid 5.5 percent to $402.80 after falling below $400 for the first time since December 2011. A key supplier, chipmaker Cirrus Logic, gave a disappointing revenue forecast, fueling worries about weakening demand for the iPhone and iPad.

The CBOE Volatility index, a measure of investor anxiety, jumped 18.3 percent to 16.51. It remains well below the 20 mark, however, suggesting market volatility is still considered relatively subdued.

Wednesday’s losses were the week’s second big sell-off, adding to views the market may be starting the pullback analysts have been speculating about for months. The market has had strong gains since the start of year, yet on Monday, the SP 500 posted its worst day since November 7 following a sharp drop in gold prices.

“After Monday’s gold selloff spooked U.S. equities, it seems as though the dip buyers are a bit less aggressive, allowing the market to fall a bit more,” said Gordon Charlop, a managing director at Rosenblatt Securities in New York.

“This could also be indicative of a muted risk tolerance and perhaps mark the beginning of a long-awaited equity pullback.”

The Dow Jones industrial average was down 138.19 points, or 0.94 percent, at 14,618.59. The Standard Poor’s 500 Index was down 22.56 points, or 1.43 percent, at 1,552.01. The Nasdaq Composite Index was down 59.96 points, or 1.84 percent, at 3,204.67.

Volume was roughly 7.89 billion shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange, the Nasdaq and the NYSE MKT, well above the average daily closing volume of about 6.36 billion this year. Decliners outpaced advancers by nearly 4 to 1 on both the NYSE and the Nasdaq.

Financial stocks also fell after Bank of America Corp posted revenue and profits that were below Wall Street expectations. Shares of the Dow component slumped 4.7 percent to $11.70.

The SP financial index was down 1.9 percent and shares of Morgan Stanley, due to report Thursday, were down 1.7 percent.

Besides financials and technology, energy and materials sectors fell sharply along with oil and copper prices. The SP 500 energy companies fell 1.9 percent and shares of Chevron slid 1.9 percent to $114.81 and helped lead declines on the Dow.

As Apple shares moved lower, the stock’s implied volatility shot higher, reflecting more risk for the stock in the next 30 days.

“This continues a trend since December 2012 where the risk paradigm in Apple has changed,” said Ophir Gottlieb, managing director of San-Francisco-based options analytics Livevol.

In a notable technical move, the SP 500 came close to falling below its 50-day moving average. It has not fallen below the level since the end of last year.

Among other tech decliners, Texas Instruments shed 4.3 percent to $34.21. Yahoo Inc declined 0.4 percent to $23.70 after the Internet company reported first-quarter revenue that missed expectations, though many Wall Street analysts raised their price targets on the stock.

SP 500 earnings are now expected to have risen 1.7 percent in the first quarter, based on actual results from 56 companies and estimates for the rest, according to Thomson Reuters data.

That expectation is up from a previous estimate of 1.5 percent growth at the start of the month, but so far just 48.2 percent of companies this reporting period have beaten revenue expectations.

After the closing bell, shares of eBay and memory chipmaker SanDisk fell after reporting results. EBay was down 2.3 percent at $54.80 while shares of SanDisk were down 3.1 percent at $54.

Adding to uncertainty in the market, authorities said a letter sent to President Barack Obama and intercepted at a mail screening facility contained the deadly poison ricin, according to preliminary testing.

“The ongoing sequence of these terrorist incidents … doesn’t create an environment for good investor psychology,” said Bucky Hellwig, senior vice president at BBT Wealth Management in Birmingham, Alabama.

(Additional reporting by Doris Frankel and Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Kenneth Barry and Nick Zieminski)

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2013/04/17/business/17reuters-markets-stocks.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Global Business Tagged With: , ,

Wall Street Edges Lower in Thin Trading

December 24, 2012 by Leave a Comment

The SP 500 index declined 0.9 percent on Friday, its biggest drop in more than a month, as a Republican plan to avoid the cliff – $600 billion in tax hikes and spending cuts that could tip the U.S. economy into recession – failed to gain any traction on Thursday night.

Sharp moves like that highlight how headlines from Washington can whipsaw markets, especially during the thinly traded period over the Christmas holidays.

Still, with the SP 500 up 0.8 percent in December and on course for its strongest month since September, some analysts are predicting that stocks will find their footing during a market seasonality known as the “Santa rally.”

“Right now we’ve seen some very constructive action in the market so I think that bodes well for this being a positive seasonal ‘Santa’ period over the coming seven days,” said Ari Wald, a technical analyst at The PrinceRidge Group.

Wald points to an all-time high in the NYSE advance-decline line, which compares the advancing and declining stocks, as indication of strong participation in the rally off November lows that is setting stocks up for their best year since 2009. A large number of advancers to decliners shows there is broad participation across the equity market.

“Pull backs are buying opportunities,” said Wald. “There has been really great participation on this move, a lot of small- and mid-cap stocks behaving well, pushing out to the upside; we’re seeing some good leadership from offensive sectors of the market as well.”

The Santa seasonality covers the last five trading days of the year and the first two of the new year. Since 1928, The SP 500 has averaged a gain of 1.8 percent during this period and risen 79 percent of the time, according to data from PrinceRidge.

The Dow Jones industrial average dropped 35.78 points, or 0.27 percent, to 13,155.06. The Standard Poor’s 500 Index fell 3.69 points, or 0.26 percent, to 1,426.46. The Nasdaq Composite Index lost 10.68 points, or 0.35 percent, to 3,010.33.

The SP 500 remains up more than 13 percent for the year, having recovered nearly all the losses suffered in the wake of the U.S. elections. The yearly gain would be the best since 2009.

Some U.S. lawmakers expressed concern on Sunday the country would go over the cliff, as some Republicans charged that was President Barack Obama’s goal. Talks are stalled with Obama and House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner out of Washington for the holidays.

“It does seem like we are continuing through the same drift of the same thing we’ve had the past couple of weeks – cliff talk,” said Nick Scheumann, wealth partner at Hefty Wealth Partners in Auburn, Indiana.

“You can’t trade on what you don’t know and we truly don’t know what they are going to do,” he said.

Congress is expected to return to Washington next Thursday as Obama returns from a trip to Hawaii. As the deadline draws closer, a ‘stop-gap’ deal appears to be the most likely outcome of any talks.

Trading volumes are expected to be muted, with U.S. equity markets scheduled to close at 1 p.m. (1800 GMT) ahead of the Christmas holiday on Tuesday.

In addition, a number of European markets will operate on a shortened session, with other markets closed entirely.

U.S. retailers may not see a sales surge this weekend as ho-hum discounts and fears about imminent tax hikes and cuts in government spending give Americans fewer reasons to open their wallets in the last few days before Christmas.

Aegerion Pharmaceuticals Inc said the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Juxtapid capsules in patients with homozygous familial hypercholesterolemia, but will conduct a post-approval study to test long-term safety and efficacy. Shares fell 4.7 percent to $24.50.

Herbalife Ltd dipped 5.8 percent to $25.68 in premarket after the company said it expects to exceed its previously announced repurchase authorization guidance and has retained Moelis Company as its strategic advisor. The declines put the stock on track for a ninth straight decline.

Yum Brands Inc advanced 1.7 percent to $64.98 after Shanghai’s food safety authority said the level of antibiotics and steroids in the company’s KFC chicken was within official limits.

(Reporting By Edward Krudy; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2012/12/24/business/24reuters-markets-stocks.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Global Business Tagged With: , ,

Wall Street Flat

December 6, 2012 by Leave a Comment

Extending Wednesday’s 6.4 percent decline, Apple was trading down 0.7 percent at $535 early on Thursday, after falling as much as 3.7 percent at the open, which brought the market capitalization of the world’s largest publicly traded company down to below $500 billion briefly. In September, it was capitalized at a record $663 billion.

Broadcom shares led the advance in chip makers with a 2.1 percent gain, one day after it forecast for fourth-quarter revenue at the high end of its target range, citing slightly better-than-expected sales in its mobile business.

The PHLX semiconductor index rose 0.4 percent.

Budget discussions continued to be a key focus for investors. President Barack Obama said there could be a quick deal to avert the “fiscal cliff” – tax hikes and spending cuts set to begin next year, possibly driving the U.S. economy back into recession – if Republican leaders agree to raise tax rates for those making more than $250,000 a year.

While Republican leaders in the House of Representatives insist that raising tax rates on the rich is a no-go, some GOP lawmakers now see it as inevitable to avoid the fiscal cliff.

“There are no real triggers here. It is just positioning going on for year-end, and this big decision” on the fiscal cliff, said Rick Meckler, president of hedge fund LibertyView Capital Management LLC in Jersey City, New Jersey.

He said Apple’s weakness was taking a toll on the market and expects equities to continue trading choppily through the day.

The Dow Jones industrial average fell 17.89 points, or 0.14 percent, to 13,016.60. The SP 500 dropped 1.78 points, or 0.13 percent, to 1,407.50. The Nasdaq Composite Index gained 2.89 points, or 0.10 percent, to 2,976.59.

Apple Inc’s rank in China’s smartphone market fell to No.6 in the third quarter as it faces tougher competition from Chinese brands, research firm IDC said Thursday. Apple’s 6.4 percent drop on Wednesday was its worst daily performance since December 2008 and dragged down the Nasdaq Composite.

Shares of Apple were down 0.7 percent at $535, after earlier falling more than 3 percent.

Sirius XM Radio shares rose 2.2 percent to $2.83 after its board approved a $2 billion stock repurchase and issued a special dividend, giving a big payout to its largest shareholder, Liberty Media.

Without action from Congress in coming weeks, tax cuts on capital gains and dividends will expire at the end of 2012.

Garmin shares rose 5 percent to $41.71 after Standard Poor’s said it would add the navigation device maker to its SP 500 index. Garmin will replace R.R. Donnelley Sons after the close of trading on December 11.

Several European equity benchmark indexes hit 2012 highs, boosted by hopes a U.S. budget deal will be reached before the year-end, and that the worst of Europe’s debt crisis might be over.

(Additional reporting by Herbert Lash; Editing by Bernadette Baum)


Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2012/12/06/business/06reuters-markets-stocks.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Business News Tagged With: , ,

Stocks Edge Higher After Jump in Manufacturing

October 20, 2011 by Leave a Comment

The Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia said regional manufacturing was “showing signs of recovery.” Its index of manufacturing, shipments and new orders was far better than economists had forecast.

The Dow Jones industrial average rose 37 points, or 0.3 percent, to 11,542 at 10:20 a.m. Eastern.

Other economic reports were mixed. The Labor Department said new applications for unemployment benefits dropped to 403,000 last week, a sign that layoffs are easing. On the down side, sales of previously-occupied homes fell 3 percent last month.

The SP 500 rose 5, or 0.4 percent, to 1,215. The Nasdaq fell 2, or 0.1 percent, to 2,602.

Several large companies reported earnings before the market opened. Southwest Airlines rose 3.7 percent after reporting income that was a penny per share higher than analysts predicted. ATT Inc. lost 0.7 percent after reporting that the number of new iPhones activated last quarter was the lowest in a year and a half.

The New York Times jumped 5.5 percent after the company reported higher profits than expected. Union Pacific was up 5.3 percent after reporting that its income jumped 16 percent, more than analysts had forecast. The railroad operator also said it expects the growth to continue.

Microsoft Corp. will report earnings after the market closes.

European markets were broadly lower. Germany’s DAX fell 1.5 percent, France’s CAC-40 fell 1.2 percent and Italy’s FTSE MIB fell 2.1 percent. Investors are concerned that differences between the leaders of Germany and France may hold up an agreement on how to protect European banks from the likelihood of a default by the Greek government.

Officials from the 17 countries that share the euro will meet at a summit this Sunday to discuss ways to contain the damage. A messy default by Greece could to huge losses for European banks that hold Greek bonds.

Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=79306f4242dddffae7765b4c97950919

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