Drug Makers In Focus…Here’s Why

• February 18, 2005
• Brice Wightman

Stocks ended mixed
today. 
Ahead of the President’s day long weekend, equities drifted for most of
the session as more disappointing economic data continue to feed rate hike
fears.  However things turned around during the final hour of trading.

Producer prices in January rose 0.3% as expected.  However the Core PPI,
which strips out food and energy, rose 0.8% versus estimates of  0.2%. Next
Tuesday, we will get the CPI numbers which should shed more light on the
inflation picture.  Lastly the University of Michigan’s Sentiment index
fell to a reading of 94.2 versus consensus of 95.5.

It was a comeback day for drug makers. Shares of Pfizer were up by nearly 7%.
The FDA voted 31-1 to keep the company’s Celebrex on the market.  The FDA
also voted 17-13 to keep Pfizer’s Bextra drug on the market.  Merck jumped
13% today today after the FDA voted 17-15 to bring Vioxx back to the market. All
three drugs were linked to increased heart problems in certain patients.

Strong sectors are: Pharmaceuticals
(
$DRG.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +2.44%  Energy
(
$DXE.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +2.06%
Oil
(
$XOI.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +1.82%

Weak sectors are:  Disk Drives
(
$DDX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
-2.32%  Broker/Dearlers
(
$XBD.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) -1.65%   Banks
 
(
$BIX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
-1.45% 

Dow		10,785.22
S&P 500		1201.59
Nasdaq		2058.62

The dollar was 
+0.04 at 83.52

Crude Oil was +0.79 at
49.01

Gold was +0.40 to 426.70

ce=”Arial” size=”2″ face=”Arial”>Volume was 1.51 billion on the NYSE and
1.60 billion on the Nasdaq.

Market breadth was negative.

NYSE	Issues
Advancing	1219	Up Vol 719
Declining	2110	Down Vol 772
	1.73	1.07
Nasdaq
Advancing	1358	Up Vol  604
Declining	1711	Down Vol 934
	1.31	1.12

Stocks in the News

Intuit Inc
(
INTU |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) reported 82 cents
per share earnings, exceeding consensus by six cents.

Akamai Technologies
(
AKAM |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)  announced revenue of $57.6 million.
Analysts were expecting $55.9 million.

Qwest is considering to submit a new offer for MCI Inc
(
MCIP |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) after
studying Verizon agreement.

NETGEAR Inc
(
NTGR |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) released higher than expected earnings of 23
cents a share, but revenue did not meet expectations. 

NVIDIA Corp
(
NVDA |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) announced earnings of 27 cents a share. It was
five cents better than expected.

 

 

 

Brice Wightman