What Are CFOs Saying About Interest Rates?
Stocks are
higher
after
the Conference Board’s consumer confidence index
came in at a 2-year high. Consumer confidence jumped almost 9 points, to 101.9,
up from a reading of 93.1 in May. Oil prices fell to a 2-month low, hitting $35.
June
should prove to be the NYSE’s slowest trading month this year. The Fed is
meeting today and tomorrow, with a 25 bp rise in rates widely anticipated. This
would be the first rate hike in 4 years. One-third of CFOs see a tripling of
rates in the next 12 months, according to a Baruch College survey.
Washington Mutual
(
WM |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
fell after it cut its earnings forecast; it now expects to earn between $3 and
$3.60 a share and announced plans to cut jobs in its mortgage business. Nortel
made a pact with Flextronics
Intenational
(
FLEX |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) where FLEX will oversee manufacturing of telecom
equipment overseas. Nortel
(
NT |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) would receive between $675 million and
$725 million in cash from Flextronics. Under the proposed deal, 2,500
employees would transfer to Flextronics.
JetBlue CEO David Neeleman said he expects summer airline traffic to be
the best since 9/11.
The US is expected to hand
Saddam Hussein over to Iraq on Wednesday, but he will remain under US guard.
| Dow | +84.55 | 10457.24 |
| S&P 500 | +7.68 | 1142.56 |
| Nasdaq | +12.10 | 2037.55 |
Strong today are Semis
(
SOX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
+1.74%, Disk Drives
(
DDX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +1.66% Networking
(
NWX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
+1.38%, Airlines
(
XAL.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +1.20%,
Weak today are Amex Gold
Bugs
(
HUI.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) -2.23%, Retail
(
RLX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating), -2.08%,
Economic news release today:
Consumer sentiment that rose to 101.9.
10-year Notes are +65 at
108 150
The dollar
is +0.52 at 89.53
Gold is -8.50 at 392.80
Crude Oil is -0.19 at
36.05
Volume is 625 million on
the NYSE, and 766 million on the Nasdaq.
Market breadth is positive.
| NYSE | Issues | |
| Advancing | 1653 | Up Vol 359 |
| Declining | 1475 | Down Vol 253 |
| Ratio | 1.12 | 1.41 |
| Nasdaq |
||
| Advancing | 1783 | Up Vol 521 |
| Declining | 1128 | Down Vol 221 |
| Ratio | 1.58 | 2.35 |
Top Dow stocks are:
Pfizer
(
PFE |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating), +1.35%,
Johnson & Johnson
(
JNJ |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating), +1.33% Merck
(
MRK |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +1.14%,
Caterpillar
(
CAT |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +1.11%Â
Stocks in the news:
Halliburton
(
HAL |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) warned investors of a
$200 million charge due to its
Barracuda-Caratinga deepwater oil project in Brazil and another $615 million
charge related to asbestos insurance recoveries.
Target
(
TGT |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) dropped 4% after warning
that June sales would be weaker than expected. This comes on the heels ofÂ
WalMart’s
(
WMT |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) lowered sales forecast on poor Father’s day demand.
Prudential expects same-store sales for Target to rise by 2% and lowered Q2 EPS
to 46 cents a share.
American Greetings
(
AM |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) reported
earnings of $4.2 million on revenue of $445.7 million. For Q2, the company
expects to break even with analysts expecting a loss of 8 cents.
Brice Wightman
bricew@tradingmarkets.com