TradingMarkets Mid-Day Movers

  • December 18, 2006
  • Darren Wong

M&A deals spark early rally before markets sell off.
Crude oil futures trade lower by 0.3% to $63.25.

From a
quick glance at our new PowerRatings
Heat Maps*,
we are continuing to see potential weakness in the Drug and Health Services sectors, whilst
no particular sector seems to offer great upside potential. Overall we are
seeing potential strength in very few stocks.

Stocks on the Move

Penn National Gaming
(
PENN |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) Upgraded by Morgan Joseph from Hold
to Buy.  PENN shares jump 9% in early trading.

U.S. Concrete
(
RMIX |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) Upgraded by Citigroup from Hold to Buy. 
RMIX shares rise 7.6%.

Express Scripts
(
ESRX |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) Proposes To Buy Caremark In $26 Bln Cash
And Stock Deal (full
story).  ESRX shares are trading fractionally higher, while CMX shares
jump nearly 11%.

SkyePharma
(
SKYE |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) Says U.S. FDA Approves Foradil Certihaler (full
story).  SKYE shares rise by 10%.

Realogy
(
H |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) To Be Acquired By Apollo Management Affiliate For $9 Bln
In Cash (full
story).  H shares soar 18%.

Dow Chemical
(
DOW |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) To Acquire Bayer’s
(
BAY |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) Wolff
Walsrode For Undisclosed Terms (full
story).  DOW shares trade fractionally lower, while BAY shares rise by
1%.

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

Market Snapshot

Dow


+4.81
12,450.33

Nasdaq
-4.62
2,452.58

S&P 500


-1.34
1,425.75

NYSE


NASDAQ

Volume
1,097,896,000
813,592,000

Advances
1459
1312

Declines
1655
1586

Up Volume
439
335

Down Volume
528
402

New Highs
209
116

New Lows
14
33

Strongest/Weakest Sectors

Strongest Sectors

Weakest Sectors

PHLX Semiconductor Index (SOX)
Amex Oil Index (XOI)

Amex Disk Drive Index (DDX)

Deutsche Bank Energy Index (DXE)

GSTI Multimedia Networking
Index (GIP)
Amex Natural Gas Index (XNG)

Economic News

Current Accounts -$225.6 bln vs -$225 bln consensus

Darren Wong
darrenw@tradingmarkets.com

Use our most popular trading tool to find out how your stocks will move in the next 5 days.


* PowerRatings Heat Maps is a powerful tool, which can help you make sense of
the markets in an instant.  PowerRatings Heat Maps are set for release in
early 2007.Â