Market Sees Green For St. Patrick’s Day
Stocks
staged a broad-based St. Patrick’s Day rally Wednesday, closing just off their
intraday highs, with
27 of the Dow 30 in positive territory.
Solid earnings from FedEx and Bear
Stearns set the stage early on, as did a benign CPI number and no bad news from
the Fed yesterday. Caterpillar, General Motors, Honeywell, Intel, and J.P.
Morgan
all gained over 2%.
Bear Stearns
(
BSC |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) earnings
leaped 32% to $361 million as it beat earnings estimates by 52 cents. Net
revenue rose 14% to $1.7 billion with strength in its bond business. FedEx
(
FDX |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) third-quarter income rose to $207 million or 68 cents a share on
lower costs with revenue rising 9% to 6.06 billion.
This was the largest gain in a year and a half; the
company increased shipments in China and cut labor costs.
FDX expects to earn $1.15 EPS for the fourth-quarter
and $3.35 for fiscal year 2004.
Shanghai-based Semiconductor
Manufacturing International Corp
(
SMI |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) debuted on the NYSE today, with
investors pouring $1.8 billion into the IPO. 103.03 million shares were offered
at $17.50 trades on the NYSE. Shares traded lower than the offering price due to
less interest in the chip sector and Chinese stocks in general for the past week
have been trading lower. Also, the IPO was delayed five days after pricing. SMI
closed at 15.50. Biopharmaceutical
company Tercia
(
TRCA |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) also started trading today and closed at 9.00.
A report by the
Energy Information Administration
showed a drop in already low gasoline inventories,
which are running 5% below the 5-year average. Oil closed at the highest price
in 13 years; the CRB Index hit a 20-year high.
For February, $17.3 billion
flowed into equity funds or $900 million a day. Vanguard and Fidelity have
gained market share in its mutual funds due to their lower costs. Foreigners
have contributed $12.8 billion in US stocks for the month of January.
Bank of America and
FleetBoston shareholders approved the $47 million merger, creating the 3rd
largest US bank, with assets of nearly $1 trillion.
| Dow | +115.63 |
10300.30 |
| S&P 500 |
+13.08 |
1123.78 |
| Nasdaq | +33.67 |
1976.76 |
The day’s leading sectors were
Internet
(
INX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +3.49%, Airlines
(
XAL.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +3.39%,
Networking
(
NWX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) +2.72%, and Oil Services
(
OSX.X |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
+2.79%.
Weak today were
Pharmaceuticals
(
PPH |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) -0.88%.
Economic news releases today
included Consumer Price Index (CPI)Â that rose by 0.3%, core CPI rose by
0.2%, both in line with estimates.
10-year Notes were -005
at 116 095
The dollar
was +0.13 at 88.72
Gold was +3.96 at 405.56
Crude Oil was +0.95 at
37.63
Volume was
1,498,402,000
on the NYSE, and 1,659,756,000
on the Nasdaq.
Market breadth was positive.
| NYSEÂ | Issues | Â |
| Advancing | 2561 | Up Vol      1110 |
| Declining | 766 | Down Vol  218 |
| Ratio | 3.34 | 5.09 |
| Nasdaq |  |  |
| Advancing | 2337 | Up Vol     1343 |
| Declining | 811 | Down Vol   163 |
| Ratio | 2.88 | 8.23 |
Stocks in the news:
Yahoo
(
YHOO |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) received an upgrade from First Albany after it raised its
fiscal 2004 estimates. First Albany likes its on-line advertising revenue growth
and broadband subscriber signup numbers.
Caremark Rx
(
CMX |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) is buying AdvancePCS
(
ADVP |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) and will
replace Tupperware
(
TUP |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) in the S&P 500 at the end of the day.
Tupperware will replace ADVP on the S&P MidCap 400. Index funds will be making
adjustments to their portfolios.
Publishing firm Scholastic
(
SCHL |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) reported a net loss of $6
million from the impact of the newly implemented Do Not Call List registry as it
hurt its sales. For the fiscal year, the company guided the street lower with
earnings at $1.95 a share.