Stocks Slammed, Vix Rockets Higher, Health Care Solid

  • August 17, 2009
  • David Goodboy

The selling that started on Friday accelerated on the first day of week with the major indexes being slammed again. Health Care was the only industry sector in the S&P 500 not suffering losses on the day. Analysts are pegging the sell off on consumer spending worries and a flight to the safety of treasuries. The fear index VIX spiked considerably in the first 30 minutes of trade as investors raced to protect their earlier gains via derivatives. The DJIA spiked down -186.06 to 9135.34, the tech heavy Nasdaq was slammed -54.68 to 1930.84 and the broad based S&P 500 cracked the 1000 support level falling -24.36 to 979.73.

First Solar
(
FSLR |
Quote |
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PowerRating) – Fell 5.18% or $7.35 to 134.43/share after it was revealed that earnings growth may have simply been the result of book keeping changes.

Lowe’s
(
LOW |
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PowerRating) – Led the S&P 500 lower dropping 10.34% or $2.36 to $20.47/share after missing analysts estimates by 3 cents.

Wendy’s/Arby’s
(
WEN |
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PowerRating) – News hit that Bill Ackman’s hedge fund sold its stake sending shares down 1.49% or 8 cents to $5.30.

US Steel
(
X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) – Fell 8.43% or $3.89 to $42.29/share on worries that the economic recovery was built on a shaky foundation.

Gold fell $12.90 to $935.80, oil gave back 76 cents to $66.74 and the fear index VIX spike nearly 17% intraday settling up 14.92% to 27.89.

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Market Snapshot

Dow

 -186.06 9135.34

NASDAQ

 -54.68 1930.84

S&P 500

 -24.36 979.73

Economic
News

Empire Manufacturing (Aug): Consensus: 3.00, Prior: -0.55

Net Long-Term TIC Flows (Jun): Consensus: $17.5B, Prior: -$19.8B

Building Permits (Jul): Consensus: 576K, Prior: 570K

Core PPI (Jul): Consensus: 0.1%, Prior: 0.5%

Housing Starts (Jul): Consensus: 598K, Prior: 582K

PPI (Jul): Consensus: -0.2%.0B, Prior: 1.8%

Crude Inventories (08/14): Consensus: NA, Prior: +2.52M

Initial Claims (08/15): Consensus: 553K, Prior: 558K

Leading Indicators (Jul): Consensus: 0.6%, Prior: 0.7%

Philadelphia Fed (Aug): Consensus: -2.0, Prior: -7.5

Existing Home Sales (Jul): Consensus: 5.00M, Prior: 4.89M

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