Stocks Recover From Heavy, Early Losses

After briefly turning
positive, the major averages have moved back down to close lower.
Weakness among gold, networking, and biotechnology stocks
contributed to the pullback.

The slight mid-day rebound
by the major averages came as some better than expected
manufacturing sector data inspired some traders to go bargain
hunting following the initial weakness.

Crude prices continued higher in
today’s session closing up 0.3% to $62.00 per barrel.  Higher
U.S. fuel demand and upcoming sanctions against Iran are
contributing to the higher price of crude.  Gold futures for
April delivery dropped 1.1% to $665.10 an ounce
.

The European markets fell
for the third consecutive day on Thursday, extending a slump that
was triggered by a plunge in the Chinese stock markets on Tuesday.

However, the benchmarks
pared some of their losses after stronger than expected U.S.
manufacturing data helped alleviate global economic and foreign
exchange worries.

Around Europe, the U.K.’s
FTSE 100 index fell 0.98% to 6,116.00, while France’s CAC 40
slipped 1.05% to 5,458.40 and Germany’s DAX index dropped 1.12% to
6,640.24.



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Stocks in
Motion

Oracle
(
ORCL |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
Renews Shopping Spree With
$3.3 Bln Hyperion
(
HYSL |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
Deal (full
story
).  ORCL shares gained 1.8%, while HYSL shares soared by 20%.

GM
(
GM |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
U.S. February Sales Up 3.4%,
Ford

(
F |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
Sales Down 13.5% (full
story
).  GM shares lost 1.2%, while F shares dropped by 2%.

Sears Holdings
(
SHLD |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
Q4 Profit Up 27%,
EPS Tops Consensus; Revenue Beats Analysts’ View (full
story
).  SHLD shares lost 2.2%.

Southwestern Energy
(
SWN |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating)
Q4 Profit Down
On Decline In Natural Gas Prices, Higher Costs (full
story
).  SWN shares closed lower by 1%.

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

Market Snapshot

Dow

-34.29 12,234.34

NASDAQ

-11.94 2,404.21

S&P 500

-3.65 1,403.17

 

NYSE NASDAQ

Volume

3,866,282,000 2,680,696,000

Advances

1331 1058

Declines

1917 2011

Up Volume

1300 713

Down Volume

2266 1835

New Highs

89 63

New Lows

61 113



Strongest/Weakest Sectors

Strongest Sectors

Weakest Sectors

Morgan Stanley Healthcare Payors Index (HMO) Morgan Stanley Healthcare Providers Index (RXH)
Amex Disk Drive Index (DDX) Amex Gold Bugs Index (HUI)
Nasdaq Transportation Index (TRANX) Amex Networking Index (NWX)


Economic
News

Construction Spending -0.8% vs
-0.4% consensus

ISM Index 52.3 vs 50.0 consensus

Personal Income +1.0% vs +0.3% consensus

Personal Spending +0.5% vs +0.4% consensus

Initial Claims 338K vs 325K consensus

Darren Wong

Associate Editor

darrenw@tradingmarkets.com