Markets Looking To Open Higher
As Senior
SalibaCo trader Joe Corona put it yesterday, we could be in for some
end-of-the-month volatility today — possibly biased to the upside. Also, we
have a CVR I signal according to the Market Bias page. Larry
Connors pointed out in his Thursday Wall Street Journal Online interview, that
the VIX is high in the context of the past two weeks, which would suggest
an upside bias for the overall market. Plus, he has an "upside
bias" signal using his proprietary marketing models on the S&P 500
and the SOX Index. In the pre-open, Nasdaq futures are pointing to a
strong opening for techs. The S&P 500 futures are also looking strong. At
8:19 AM ET, we have the SP 500 (SPM2) up 4.70, Dow Jones (DJM2)
up 39.00, NASDAQ 100 (NDM2) up 7.00.
Highlights
include:
Lehman Brothers
upgraded TXU Corp. (TXU)
to "strong buy" from "buy."
Bear Stearns upgraded UPS
(UPS)
to "buy" from "neutral."
Avalon
reiterated its "buy" rating for Biogen (BGEN).
Wedbush Morgan
reiterated its "buy" rating for Xilinx Inc. (XLNX)
Here are
indications of strength the pre-opening action in the techs: Dell
Computer (DELL),
up 0.14 at 27.16; Cisco Systems (CSCO),
up 0.09 at 16.10; Intel
(INTC),
up 0.10 at 27.52; Oracle (ORCL),
up 0.148 at 8.568; Sun Micro
(SUNW),
up 0.16 at 7.05; Yahoo (YHOO),
up 0.042 at 16.462; and Qualcomm
(QCOM),
up 0.175 at 31.355.