Two Potential Market Movers For Friday

Stocks were slightly higher ahead of tomorrow’s jobs report.
 The S&P put in a new rally high, up 4.3% in the last three
weeks. The Dow is off 2.1% year to date, and the Nasdaq, -3.6%. Tomorrow before
the open, look for the jobs number: the consensus is 180K. Then at 10 AM ET,
look for the ISM Index: consensus 61.0.

The EIA said crude inventories rose 1.49 mm barrels–more than
expected–while gas inventories rose 1.3 mm barrels. Distillate inventories rose
by 700K barrels.

Sun Microsystems
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is buying Storage Technology
(
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for $4.1 billion ($37/share).
The deal is expected to close in early Fall 2005.

eBay
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is buying Shopping.com
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for $620
million cash.

The NYSE halted trading 4 minutes early on Wednesday; a communications
problem with SIAC (Securities Industry Communications System) was cited. There
will be an investigation into what happened. There is a NYSE board meeting
today. On tap: NYSE/ARCA deal, a possible hybrid trading system and the new SEC
chief.

President Bush nominated Rep. Christopher Cox (R, CA) as the new
SEC
head. Yesterday, William Donaldson, whose aggressive regulation
antagonized some, announced he was stepping down.

Jobless claims for the week ending 5/28 rose 25K to 350K. Non-farm
productivity for Q1 rose 2.9%, slightly better than expected. continuing
claims. Challenger reported layoffs in May were 82,283 vs 57,861 in
April.

The ECB left all key interest rates unchanged. The dollar is at
8-month lows vs. the euro.

J.P. Morgan’s
(
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trading profit will be the worst in recent
memory, says President Jamie Dimon.

Biogen
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said there was a fourth Tysabri-related illness.
Elan
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is a partner in the drug. (Editor’s Note: In
the Marketflash–earlier today–I mistakenly reported it as a death.)

Goldman said that iPod
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sales may not grow quite as robustly as
previously expected.

Strong sectors were:  Airlines
(
$XAL.X |
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+5.90%  
Disk Drives

(
$DDX.X |
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+3.18%   Semis
(
$SOX.X |
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+1.84%           

Weak sectors were:  Computer Hardware
(
$HWI.X |
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-0.99%
  Gold
(
$HUI.X |
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-0.91%   Chemicals

(
$CEX.X |
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-0.46%

Dow +2.59 10,552.46
Nasdaq +9.60 2097.46
S&P 500 +2.11 1204.26

The dollar was -0.33 at
87.81

Crude Oil was -0.97 at
53.63.

Gold was +5.10 at 421.40

ce=”Arial” size=”2″ face=”Arial”>Volume was 1.4 billion on the NYSE and
1.78 billion on the Nasdaq.

Market breadth was positive.

NYSE Issues
Advancing 1642 Up Vol 323
Declining 1424 Down Vol 273
1.15 1.18
Nasdaq
Advancing 1390 Up Vol 392
Declining 1363 Down Vol 273
1.01 1.43

Stocks in the News

bebe
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same store sales rose 40%.

Wet Seal
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same store sales rose 56.9%.

Men’s Wearhouse
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said same store sales rose 12.8%.

Neiman Marcus
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beat by 0.06.

The FDA barred Tropicana
(
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from making heart-related health
claims for orange juice.

Gap Inc.
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same store sales fell 8%.

Brice Wightman