AMD Blowout Earnings; Plus, Apple’s Results
Stocks closed slightly lower Wednesday, but after a decent trading session.
A gap lower at the open and a double bottom later in the day provided traders
with good opportunity.
Consumer prices rose sharply as energy
and clothing costs soared. The CPI index rose 0.5% in March, with exports up 4% — the biggest monthly increase since 1996. Interest-rate-sensitive stocks such as
homebuilders and banks continue to be weak on continued fears of an interest
rate hike.
Bank of America
(
BAC |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) reported earnings that grew 11% to $2.68 billion with revenue up 7% at $9.69 billion.
The stock sold off, though, as a flattening yield curve is a negative for banks.
Dow component DuPont
(
DD |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
raised its profit outlook on strength in its agriculture and nutrition business.
It now expects earnings to reach 95 cents for the quarter and $2.20 for the
year. Harley Davidson
(
HDI |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) posted earnings of $204.6 million on revenue that rose
4.7% to $1.17 billion. Profits jumped 10%. The company left its 2004 motorcycle production target of
317,000 unchanged and reiterated its long-range goal of 400,000 in 2007.
Equity fund flows were the
largest since the end of January.
The American Automobile
Association said that the price of a gallon of regular gas hit another high —
at $1.783.
After the close, Advanced
Micro Devices
(
AMD |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) reported Q1 of $0.12 vs a $0.04 estimate, on
revenues of $1.24 billion vs $1.2 estimate. A year ago revenues were $714
million. Net income was $45 million vs a loss a year ago. For Q2 the
company said sales would be lower in computational products but higher in the
memory group. Apple Computer
(
AAPL |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) reported $0.14 vs. $0.10 on
$1.19 billion revenue and $46 million net income. iPod shipments rose 900% to
807,000 units. The company raised Q3 revenue estimates to $1.9 and earnings to
$0.12 – $0.13 from 0.09. SanDisk
(
SNDK |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)Â beat by0.02 and guided
Y04 higher. Lam Research
(
LRCX |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) beat by 0.03 on 73% higher revenues.
Redback Networks
(
RBAK |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) missed by a penny. Rambus
(
RMBS |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
was in-line after a one-time gain, and Texas Instruments
(
TXN |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) was
also in-line and guided higher. Revenue rose 34%.
| Dow | -3.33 | 10377.95 |
| S&P 500 |
-1.27 | 1128.17 |
| Nasdaq | -5.23 | 2024.85 |
The day’s leading sectors were
Pharmaceuticals
(
PPH |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +1.53%,
Disk Drives
(
DDX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +1.41% Airlines
(
XAL.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +0.78%,
Chemicals
(
CEX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +0.97%, and Biotechs
(
BTK.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
+0.58%.
Weak today were Gold
(
XAU.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) -2.08%, and Healthcare
(
HMO.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) -1.84%
and Banks
(
BKX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) -1.33%.
Economic news releases today
included CPI rising +0.5% and the US trade deficit narrowing to $42.1 billion.
10-year Notes were -100 at
111 080
The dollar
was +0.33 at 90.16
Gold was -6.54 at 399.35
Crude oil was -0.30 at
36.42
Volume was
1,548,003,000 on
the NYSE, and 1,844,008,000 on the Nasdaq.
Market breadth was negative.
| NYSE | Issues | |
| Advancing |
749 | Up Vol 470 |
| Declining | 2626 | Down Vol 1039 |
| Ratio | 3.50 | 2.21 |
| Nasdaq |
||
| Advancing |
1252 | Up Vol 750 |
| Declining |
1953 | Down Vol 1034 |
| Ratio | 1.55 | 1.37 |
Stocks in the news:
Take-Two Interactive
Software
(
TTWO |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) will post a quarterly loss of 15 cents a share on
revenue of $170 million. News of CEO Jeffrey Lapin’s resignation and the company
cutting its earnings forecast sent TTWO down 11%.
Georgia-Pacific
(
GP |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
is expecting higher earnings of 60 cents on strong performance of its building
products.
McDonalds
(
MCD |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) posted an 11.5%
increase in sales on strong domestic revenue. US same-store sales were +9.9%,
but European sales were +2.9%.
Brice Wightman
bricew@tradingmarkets.com