Cisco Earnings, Plus, Chinese Internets Crunched!
Stocks were up slightly in light volume Tuesday,
which began with the discovery of ricin in the mailroom of Senate Republican
Leader Bill Frist.
After the close, Cisco
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reported Q2 of 0.18 vs. a 0.17 estimate on revenues of $5.4B vs. a $5.3B
estimate. On a conference call, CEO John Chambers said “it is clear that the
global economy is improving.” Net income fell from a year ago due to an
accounting change.
General Mills
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received a Wells Notice from the SEC regarding the company’s sales practices and
related accounting. A Wells Notice is an indication that charges are
forthcoming. Trimble Navigation
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PowerRating) beat by 0.03 and declared a
3:2 stock split. Ciena
(
CIEN |
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PowerRating) guided below consensus; the stock was
halted after hours. Icos
(
ICOS |
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PowerRating) beat by 0.06 but issued lowered
guidance for ’04.
Stun gun maker Taser
International
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PowerRating) fell 5% after reporting earnings of $2.8 million
vs. $67,000 a year ago. Sales jumped 386% to $10.8 million, topping
expectations. Analysts cautioned investors as the stock has risen more than
4100% over the past year. The stock gapped higher and sold off throughout the
session, particularly in the last half of trading.
The country’s largest hospital
network HCA
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HCA |
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PowerRating) reported a profit of $317 million on revenue of
$5.6 billion, up 11% from a year ago. Higher hospital admissions from the flu
outbreak was the main reason for higher earnings. The company raised its
quarterly dividend to 13 cents a share.
Tyco International
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reported a net profit of $719 million with strong growth in its electronics,
fire & security and health-care units. Revenue was up 8.6% to $9.7 billion, with
free cash flow at $736 million in the first quarter, up $600 million from the
previous year.
Chinese internet stocks fell
after Sohu.com
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PowerRating) reported earnings, which were at the high end
of the range, but revenues came in near the low end of guidance. Sohu fell 20%.
Sina Corp
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PowerRating) fell 8%.
Goldman Sachs downgraded
the entire US Semiconductor capital equipment sector to neutral, as it believes
the industry has passed normalized levels of free cash-flow.
Here are the results of three
IPOs today: GTx Inc (GTXI) 12.98, -1.52; TRW Auto
(TRW) 26.99, -1.01; The Bancorp (TBBK) 16, +3.50.
| Dow | +6.00 | 10505.18 |
| S&P 500 |
+0.77 | 1136.03 |
| Nasdaq | +3.06 | 2066.21 |
The day’s leading sectors were
Pharmaceuticals
(
DRG.X |
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PowerRating) +0.70%, Computer Technology
(
XCI.X |
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PowerRating)
+0.69%, Healthcare
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HCX.X |
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PowerRating) +0.65%, and Utilities
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UTY.X |
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PowerRating)
+0.57%
Weak today were Airlines
(
XAL.X |
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PowerRating) -2.92%, and Disk Drives
(
DDX.X |
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PowerRating) -2.77%, .
No Economic news releases
today.
10-year Notes were +145
at 113 265.
The dollar
was -0.67 at 86.86.
Gold was -0.74 at
398.76.
Crude Oil was -0.83 at
34.10.
Volume was
1,478,021,0000 on
the NYSE, and 1,834,913,000 on the Nasdaq.
Market breadth was mixed.
| NYSE | Issues | |
| Advancing | 1699 | Up Vol 649 |
| Declining | 1589 | Down Vol 809 |
| Ratio | 1.07 | 1.24 |
| Nasdaq | ||
| Advancing | 1464 | Up Vol 696 |
| Declining | 1691 | Down Vol 1022 |
| Ratio | 1.15 | 1.47 |
Other Stocks
in the News:
Insurer Aflac
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AFL |
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PowerRating) reported
fourth-quarter net income of $73 million on revenue of $2.8 billion. Income was
much lower than previous years due to write downs of its Parmalat holdings.
Pitney Bowes
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PBI |
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News |
PowerRating) reported
fourth-quarter earnings with higher revenue of $1.22 billion and net profit from
continuing operations of $143.6 million.
Consumer goods maker Colgate-Palmolive
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CL |
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PowerRating)
reported earnings of $372.1 million on revenue of $2.57 billion.
Better-than-expected performance in its Latin American, Asian and European
segments helped boost earnings.
bricew@tradingmarkets.com