Stocks Drop, Inflation Soars

• December 13, 2007
• Ashton Dorkins

Stocks are lower on Thursday, despite positive retail sales and jobless claims data, which was offset by the largest jump in producer prices in 34 years.

Shares of Lehman Brothers
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PowerRating) are lower after the company reported fourth quarter earnings above analyst estimates (read more).

Costco Wholesale
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Dow Chemical
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Biogen Idec
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PowerRating) is down more than 26% after the company announced yesterday that is was unable to find a buyer (read more).

Ciena
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Washington Mutual
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Market Snapshot

Dow -76.90 13397.00 NASDAQ -27.10 2644.04 S&P 500 -14.11 1472.48   NYSE NASDAQ Volume 665,121,870 1,067,674,199 Up Volume 102,576,060 309,019,566 Down Volume 557,872,820 738,147,763 Advances 626 751 Declines 2503 2123 New Highs 17 20 New Lows 144 133

Strongest/Weakest Industry Groups

Strongest Industries % Change Weakest Industries % Change Chemicals – Major Diversified +2.86% Money Center Banks -8.77% Diversified Utilities +0.88% Silver -5.67% Networking & Communication Devices +0.78% Toy & Hobby Stores -5.14%

Economic News

Retail Sales (Nov): Actual 1.2%, Consensus 0.6% Initial Claims (12/08): Actual 333K, Consensus 335K Business Inventories (Oct): Actual 0.1%, Consensus 0.3% PPI (Nov): Actual 3.2%, Consensus 1.5%