Wall Street Defies Foreign Markets
Today’s
price action pushed up off the opening bell and never looked back in
this abbreviated trading session. Technology locked in the biggest gains as
there was very little weakness across the sectors.
The
Dow Jones Industrial Average
(
$INDU.X |
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to 9,959.71.
The S&P 500
(
$SPX.X |
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PowerRating) closed up 1.12%
to 1,149.76.
The Nasdaq
(
$COMPQ.X |
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PowerRating) closed up 1.49%
to 1,903.01.
Despite sharp declines in
foreign markets, Wall Street was able to go into buy mode for the holiday. Today
is considered to be the start of the holiday season as eyes are turning towards
the retailers for indications of strength and weakness. An official
declaration of “a recession” by The National Bureau of Economic
Research is also expected to come later today in a conference call.
Overall
NYSE volume was 410,149,000.
NYSE advancing issues were 2,159,
with up volume at 331,345,000;
declining issues were 746, with
down volume at 75,913,000.
Overall Nasdaq volume was 572,171,000.
Nasdaq advancing issues were 2,176,
with up volume at 492,802,000;
declining issues were 1,022 with
down volume at 62,457,000. The VIX
was down 0.52Â to 24.80. The TRIN
was down 0.69 to 0.66. Today’s abbreviated session on light volume gives
analysts very little to go on as far as measuring market strength. The day’ nice
gains bode well for the markets going into the weekend yet some of our Market
Bias Indicators are still turned down.
Top
sectors of the day were the Airline
Index
(
$XAL.X |
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PowerRating)
up 3.97%
to 89.61 and
the Biotechnology Index
(
$BTK.X |
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PowerRating)
up 2.52%
to 599.92.
Losing
sectors of the day were the Gold
And Silver Sector Index
(
$XAU |
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PowerRating)
down 0.12%
to 49.83, and
the Pharmaceutical Index
(
$DRG.X |
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PowerRating)
down 0.09%
to 401.5.
Oil
companies ChevronTexaco
(
CVX |
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PowerRating)
gained 0.60% to close at 86.60
and ExxonMobil
(
XOM |
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PowerRating) is up 1.50%
to 38.45,
after Russia said it would cut oil exports by 50,000 barrels a day in the fourth
quarter, disappointing those who anticipated a bigger cut.
Drug
maker Eli Lilly
(
LLY |
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PowerRating)
down
1.13% to 82.39
had its drug
Xigris approved by
the Food and Drug Administration. Analysts believe the new product could
generate sales over 1 billion annually.
Tobacco
company RJ Reynolds
(
RJR |
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PowerRating)
dipped
0.63% to 56.44 on announcing the
acquisition of Santa Fe Natural Tobacco for $320 million.
Shares of Swedish
mobile systems maker Ericsson
(
ERICY |
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PowerRating)
rose 6.32%
to 5.55 after the company announced it expects few rivals in the
market for its third-generation mobile phones.
Microchip
maker United Microelectronics Corp.
(
UMC |
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PowerRating)
fell
3.77% to 7.15 after the company
announced it would release $350 million worth of convertible bonds.
Drug maker IVAX
(
IVX |
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PowerRating)
rose 5.18% to
it was announced that the
Food and Drug Administration approved its metformin hydrochloride tablets.
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