TradingMarkets Mid-Day Movers

• February 8, 2007
• Darren Wong

The U.S. stock markets are
seeing some weakness in late-morning trading on Thursday, with
housing and financial stocks posting some notable losses. The
major averages have all moved into negative territory after ending
the previous session higher. 
Homebuilders Toll Brothers
(
TOL |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating), Lennar
(
LEN |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating),
and KB Homes
(
KBH |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) are all trading lower this morning
by over 3%.

Crude trades near breakeven
through the morning currently up $0.30 to $58.01 a barrel. 
Prices have been holding in the $57.25 – $59.99 range this week as
frigid conditions persist through much of the country. 

Gold for April delivery is trading
higher by $2.10 to $659.40 an ounce.

The weakness that we have been anticipating in our PowerRatings
Heat Maps*
is continuing to play out.  Some of the lowest ranked sectors
from Wednesday’s close continue to be electronics, diversified
services, and energy. 

Click here for a free trial to PowerRatings
Heat Maps*,
so that you can quickly gauge overall market direction and go deeper into
individual sectors.

Stocks in Motion

Disney ( DIS | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) Q1 Profit Jumps, Tops Estimate (full story).  DIS shares lose 1.3% in early trading. Wal-Mart ( WMT | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) Jan. Comps. Rises 2.2%, Sees Feb. Comps. Growth Of 1-2% (full story).  WMT shares move lower by 0.4%. Marriott International ( MAR | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) Q4 Profit Declines; Adj. EPS Increases; Guides Q1, FY07 (full story).  MAR shares gain 1.7%. Weak Housing Climate Takes Toll On Toll Brothers‘ ( TOL | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) Q1 (full story).  TOL shares lose 3.5%. Akamai Technologies ( AKAM | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) Q4 GAAP Profit Drops On Expenses, Charges; Normalized EPS Beats View (full story).  AKAM shares are trading fractionally higher. Costco Wholesale ( COST | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) Jan. Comps. Up 2%; Net Sales Rise 7% (full story).  COST shares are trading fractionally lower. For more stories as they happen, go to our Breaking News section.

Market Snapshot

Dow -72.26 12,597.61 NASDAQ -7.86 2,482.64 S&P 500 -6.25 1,443.78   NYSE NASDAQ Volume 1,177,110,000 864,828,000 Advances 1174 1208 Declines 1892 1660 Up Volume 387 284 Down Volume 654 492 New Highs 221 123 New Lows 18 34

Strongest/Weakest Sectors

Strongest Sectors Weakest Sectors GSTI Multimedia Index (GIP) S&P Banking Index (BIX) Amex Gold BugsIndex (HUI) Amex Securities Broker/Dealer Index (XBD) GSTI Hardware Index (GHA) PHLX/KBW Bank Sector Index (BKX)

Economic News

Wholesale Inventories -0.5% vs 0.7% consensus Initial Claims 311K vs 310K consensus

Darren Wong

Associate Editor

darrenw@tradingmarkets.com