HPQ Earnings, Plus, This Dow Component CEO Leaving
Stocks
fell with a late day drop caused by
hedge fund selling. Breadth was
positive early on but turned negative at the drop. Applied
Materials
(
AMAT |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) reported higher
first-quarter income of $82 million, with revenue rising to $1.56 billion and
orders up by 30%. AMAT expects another 30% increase in current-quarter orders
with earnings reaching 7 cents per share on revenue of $1.29 billion.
Twenty-five percent of new orders came from China and Asia last quarter. Chip-maker
OmniVision
(
OVTI |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) posted earnings of 28 cents a share on revenue of
$94.5 million, +22%. The company expects sales to reach $98 million with
earnings of about 30 cents a share. Retailer Wal-Mart
(
WMT |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) reported
earnings of $2.72 billion, + 8.4%, on sales of $75.2 billion.
Former Enron CEO
Jeff Skilling was indicted Thursday in Houston on 42 counts, including securities
fraud, conspiracy, insider trading and making false statements. Skilling
resigned in 2001, before the scandal broke. His attorney Daniel Petrocelli said the
government was making false accusations against his client.
After the close, Hewlett
Packard [HPQ|HPQ} reported a Q1 inline at 0.35. Revenues were $19.5 vs $19.3
billion estimate; net income was $930.6 million. Results in printing and
imaging, the company’s core business, were somewhat soft. The company affirmed
its fiscal ’04 outlook.
Serena
(
SRNA |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) beat
by a penny, ex items, as did BEA Systems
(
BEAS |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating). Guess
(
GES |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
beat by 0.05 and Ocular Sciences
(
OCLR |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) beat by penny and guided
higher. Nordstrom
(
JWN |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) beat by 0.08 and guided higher for Q1 and FY
’04. Univision
(
UVN |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) beat by a penny and guided inline.
KPMG said that Federal
prosecutors are investigating some tax shelters that were sold by the company
and that they are cooperating with the investigation.
Coca Cola
(
KO |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) CEO
Doug Daft is stepping down at year end, saying he is leaving on his own and not
being forced out. Daft has been Coke’s CEO since 1999, and cut jobs and
streamlined operations during his tenure. Company COO Steve Heyer is a possible
replacement.
| Dow | -7.26 | 10664.73 |
| S&P 500 |
-4.76 | 1147.06 |
| Nasdaq | -30.51 |
2045.96 |
The day’s leading sectors were
Pharmaceuticals
(
PPH |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +0.48%, Chemicals
(
CEX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +0.39%,
Homebuilders
(
HGX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +0.35% and Oil
(
OSX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +0.32%.
Weak today were Networking
(
NWX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) -2.56%, and Gold & Silver
(
XAU.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) -1.96%,
Economic news releases included
lower initial claims at 344K.
10-year Notes were +010
at 114 260
The dollar
was +0.10 at 85.98
Gold was -2.36 at
409.14.
Volume was
1,516,498,000 on
the NYSE, and 2,058,533,000 on the Nasdaq.
Market breadth was positive.
| NYSE | Issues | |
| Advancing | 1213 | Up Vol 556 |
| Declining | 2074 | Down Vol 921 |
| Ratio | 1.70 | 1.65 |
| Nasdaq | ||
| Advancing | 1093 | Up Vol 366 |
| Declining | 2073 | Dow Vol 1655 |
| Ratio | 1.89 | 4.52 |
Stocks in the news:
Target
(
TGT |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) posted strong
earnings of $832 million or 91 cents on revenue of $15.57 billion. Higher
margins offset higher expenses with same-store sales up 4.9%.
Intuit
(
INTU |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) posted an increase
of 16% in earnings on revenue of $636.3 million. Earnings came in at $149.1
million. For the next quarter, INTU guided higher at $700 million, or about
$1.14 cents a share.
Telecommunications maker Qwest
(
Q |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
reported a net loss of $307 million as revenue dropped 5.6% to $3.5 billion due
to competition from local voice and wireless services.
For the first time, Bluefly
(
BFLY |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
reported a net income, with sales rising 42%. Earnings came in at $111,000 on
sales of $14 million