Stocks Closed Mixed Despite Positive Jobs Data

  • March 9, 2007
  • Darren Wong

U.S. stocks ended Friday’s session
with the Dow and S&P up fractionally and the Nasdaq marginally
lower.  This was despite positive jobs data released this
morning.  The unemployment rate fell to 4.5% from 4.6% as
97,000 nonfarm jobs were added in February. 

Crude
futures closed lower on the New York Mercantile Exchange on warm
weather forecasts.  Crude finished the session down 2.5% to
$60.10 a barrel. 
Gold futures for April delivery moved
lower by 0.5% to $652.00 an ounce.

Around Europe, the U.K.’s
FTSE 100 index surged up 0.28% to 6,245.20, while France’s CAC 40
index rose 0.25% to 5,537.84 and Germany’s DAX index advanced
0.05% to 6,716.52.



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Stocks in
Motion

Big Lots
(
BIG |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) Q4 Profit Soars More Than
Seven-folds; EPS From Cont. Opns Tops Street View; Guides Q1, FY07; To Buyback
Up To $600 Mln Shares (full
story).  BIG shares jumped 16.5%.

Procter & Gamble
(
PG |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) Reaffirms Q3 EPS And
Sales Outlook (full
story).  PG shares lost 0.24%.

TD Ameritrade
(
AMTD |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) Sees Q2 EPS At Low
End Of $0.23 – $0.29 Range; Reveals Feb. Trading Metrics (full
story).  AMTD shares fell by 1.3%.

DirecTV
(
DTV |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) Signs Seven-year-agreement
With Major League Baseball To Air Out-of-market Games (full
story).  DTV shares rise by 0.7%.

For more stories as they happen, go to our
Breaking News section.

Market Snapshot

Dow

 +15.62 12,276.32

NASDAQ

 -0.18 2,387.55

S&P 500

 +0.96 1,402.85

 

 NYSE NASDAQ

Volume

 2,646,953,000 1,850,841,000

Advances

 1866 1539

Declines

 1337 1431

Up Volume

 1318 798

Down Volume

 1087 953

New Highs

 75 75

New Lows

 28 75



Strongest/Weakest Sectors

Strongest Sectors

Weakest Sectors
S&P Chemicals Index (CEX) GSTI Internet Index (GIN)
Dow Jones Equity REIT Index (DJR) Morgan Stanley Healthcare Payors Index (HMO)
North American Telecommunications Index (XTC) Dow Jones Internet Commerce Index (ECM)


Economic
News

Wholesale Inventories +0.7% vs
+0.1% consensus

Trade Balance -$59.1bln vs -$60 bln
consensus

Average Workweek 33.7 vs 33.8 consensus

Hourly Earnings m/m: +0.4% vs +0.3% consensus, +0.2% prior

Unemployment Rate 4.5% vs 4.6% consensus

Nonfarm Payrolls 97K vs 100K consensus

Darren Wong

Associate Editor

darrenw@tradingmarkets.com