Lower Oil Fuels Rally

Stocks rose Wednesday as crude oil eased back below
$69.

Construction-related stocks did extremely well, including Building
Materials
(
BMHC |
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(
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Eagle Materials
(
EXP |
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(
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Texas Industries
(
TXI |
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+19%, Florida Rock
(
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+7%.

Tiffany
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beat by 0.06 and raised its fiscal year 2006 guidance. (full
story)

Crude inventories fell 1.52 million barrels vs the consensus of a 1.0
million barrel build. Gasoline inventories fell by 508,000 vs a consensus of a
fall of 1.63 million barrels. Distillates rose 2.75 million barrels, more than
expected.

Airlines cancelled flights due to lack of fuel. Hotels were down, including
Marriot
(
MAR |
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The federal government asked Carnival Cruise Lines
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could use its ships as emergency shelters.

MasterCard, the 2nd largest U.S. credit card association, plans to go
public. Member banks will retain 41% ownership. Also,
Traffic.com filed for an IPO. The company provides real-time traffic
information in large U.S. metropolitan cities. Proposed symbol: TRFC.

GDP grew at 3.3%, slightly lower than expected. The Chicago PMI was 49.2,
much lower than expected.

After the close, Men’s Wearhouse
(
MW |
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8.5%, more than expected.

Bloomberg reported that Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim feels Bellsouth
(
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(
SBC |
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(
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and owns stakes in all.

Strong Sectors were:   Oil Services 
(
OSX |
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+3.56%    Oil 

(
XOI |
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+3.27%    Biotech

(
BTK |
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+2.58%

ADC Telecom
(
ADCT |
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Sigma Designs
(
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Altria
(
MO |
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story) Prudential upped its price target to $74.

Creative Technology
(
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method of organizing files in a digital music player. The company said Apple has
used the same technology in its iPod players. Apple does not have a patent for a
digital music system.

Novellus
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predictions. The company now sees 0.20-0.21, down from 0.21-0.22 at the
beginning of the quarter.

With the Port of New Orleans closed, truckers and railroads may have to pick
up some slack. Yellow Freight
(
YELL |
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(
BNI |
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Brice Wightman