Up Over 8% On Nearly Doubled Earnings!


Stocks are higher on better-than-expected earnings reports.

Wholesale prices jumped 0.5% from rising food prices while weekly initial claims
only fell by 9,000 to 353,000.
eBay
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reported earnings that almost doubled to $200.1 million with revenue
up to $756.2 million. EBAY upped its full year revenue forecast to $3.15 billion
with profits of $1.13 a share.

Drug maker Merck
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posted quarterly profits that fell to $1.62 billion, beating consensus by a
penny with sales flat at $5.6 billion. Sales of its Fosamax fell 4% to $759
million while Zocor sales rose 10% to $1.3 billion.

KLA Tencor
(
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posted a
profit of $66 million with revenue up at $390 million but warned that orders may
drop 15% for this quarter.

Dow
+121.21

10438.32
S&P 500

+12.782

1136.89
Nasdaq
+28.54

2024.11

The day’s leading sectors are Airlines
(
XAL.X |
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+3.86%, Internet
(
ECM.X |
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+3.16%, Oil
Services

(
OSX.X |
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+2.51%, Retail
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, +2.08%.

Weak today are Disk Drives
(
DDX.X |
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-0.05%.

Economic news releases today
included PPI up 0.5%, but PPI excluding food and energy costs was up 0.2%.
Initial claims rose to 353,000.

10-year Notes are +60 at
111 050

The dollar
is -0.12 at 91.30

Gold is +1.30 at 392.70

Crude Oil is +0.59 at
36.32

Volume is 770,000,000 on
the NYSE, and 978,000,000 on the Nasdaq.

Market breadth is positive.

NYSE Issues
Advancing
2263 Up Vol 593
Declining 854 Down Vol 161
Ratio 2.65 3.68
Nasdaq
Advancing
1985 Up Vol 690
Declining
1002 Down Vol 258
Ratio 1.98 2.67


Top Dow stocks are:

Alcoa
(
AA |
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, +5.29% at
33.43, Caterpillar
(
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+4.18% at 84.41 Boeing
(
BA |
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+3.33% at 42.20, 3M
(
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, +2.95% at 86.36.

Stocks in the news:

KLA Tencor
(
KLAC |
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PowerRating)

posted a profit of $66 million with revenue up at $390 million but warned that
orders may drop 15% for this quarter.

Caterpillar
(
CAT |
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PowerRating)
reported
earnings of $412 million with revenue rising 34% to $6.47 billion, well ahead of
consensus.

JetBlue
(
JBLU |
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reported earnings
of $15.2 million with operating revenue up 33.1% at $289 million despite
seasonal sluggishness in its East-West markets.

Yum Brands
(
YUM |
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said its
first-quarter profit rose 21% to $142 million with revenue at $1.97 billion. The
company also upped its 2004 earnings forecasts to $2.32 a share.

Brice Wightman

bricew@tradingmarkets.com