You Can’t Light A Fire Without A Spark
Monday the markets opened up only to
trade sideways to lower throughout the trading day.
The Dow Jones Industrials closed lower
0.1% and the Nasdaq Composite lost 0.5% on light volume.
IRS refund checks appeared to have fueled some
retail buying in electronics last week, according to Tony Crescenzi. These
numbers from key retailers could very well represent the market’s sentiment on
what the remaining check recipients will be do with their tax rebates. Looking at this news, we could optimistically say it may very well
spark the markets to move.
One stock taking in some gains this
trading session was Heller Financial
(
HF |
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PowerRating) which gained 47.6% after General
Electric
(
GE |
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PowerRating) announced a tender offer to acquire the company for $5.3
billion.
Mercury General
(
MCY |
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PowerRating) moved higher
10.6% after the company reported Q2 earnings of 49 cents a share compared to 47
cents a share for the same quarter one year ago.Â
Fair Isaac & Company
(
FIC |
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PowerRating)
shares rose 6.1% after losing ground Friday on a downgrade by USB Piper Jaffray
Italian handbag designer Gucci
(
GUC |
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PowerRating)
increased 2.8% on the news that Berkshire Partners LLC. purchased William
Carter from Investcorp for $450 million. Investcorp is
known for previous investments in the company.
Among sectors showing strength were
the Pharmaceutical Index
(
$DRG.X |
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PowerRating) which gained 0.7%.
The Semiconductor Index
(
$SOX.X |
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PowerRating)
rose 0.6%
Also in the green was the Retail Index
(
$RLX.X |
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PowerRating), which tacked on 0.6% as retailers like
Federated Department Stores
(
FD |
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PowerRating), which gained 3.9%, and J.C. Penny
(
JCP |
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PowerRating),
moving up 3.1%, helped the index.
Biotechnology company Aviron’s
(
AVIR |
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PowerRating)
shares were hammered 33.7% after the FDA recommended the company’s FluMist not
be approved, citing safety issues.
HealthNet
(
HNT |
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PowerRating) shares lost 11.1%
after Salomon Smith Barney cut its rating on the company from Outperform to
Neutral.
Sony Electronics
(
SNE |
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PowerRating) slid 10.5%.
Drug company Salix Pharmaceuticals’
(
SLXP |
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PowerRating)
shares fell 12.6% after being downgraded by UBS Warburg.
Championship Auto Racing Teams
(
MPH |
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PowerRating)
shares fell 12.4%.
The Biotechnology Index
(
$BTK.X |
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PowerRating)
slid 2.6% with the help of the aforementioned Aviron
(
AVIR |
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PowerRating).
Slipping in the session also was the
Gold and Silver Index
(
$XAU.X |
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PowerRating) which lost 2.7%.
The Securities Broker/Dealer Index
(
$XBD.X |
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PowerRating)
lost 1.7% with the help of Lehman Brothers
(
LEH |
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PowerRating), which was downgraded by
Goldman Sachs from Market Outperform to Market Perform.
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