Day Traders Diary
3/23/11
U.S. stocks opened lower Wednesday after Adobe Systems and a couple of other techs projected quarterly profits below expectations as the crisis in Japan dented sales. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 24 points to 11,994. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index declined 4 points to 1,289. The Nasdaq Composite declined 9 points to 2,673. Adobe is down 4.5% dragging the Nasdaq with it. LED maker, Cree is down 9% after lowering earnings guidance. The rest of the big cap techs like Apple, Google, and IBM are lower as well. Texas Instruments and Maxim Integrated are lower even though both were upgraded. Oracle and Research in Motion are modestly lower ahead of earnings tomorrow. Jabil Circuit is one of the few techs bucking the trend, trading up 12% following earnings. The financials are taking a big hit this morning. Bank of America is down 3% after the Fed rejects their offer to boost the dividend to shareholders. That's not a good sign. SunTrust is down a percent on a downgrade. Discover is one of the few financials higher after easily beating estimates. The commodities are all lower except for Freeport McMoran. Investors like the copper play this morning. Through the first hour the averages remained in the red, but not far from the unchanged level. A few more stocks are popping into the green. Through the morning the averages slowly moved back toward the unchanged level led by commodities, although the oil and oil related stocks are lower. In the afternoon the Dow moved into the green led by commodities and industrial plays. A few more techs are in the green, but not the financials. They remain in the doghouse. Heading into the last hour the Dow rose 85 points. The Nasdaq improved by 16 points. In the last hour the averages slipped a little from the highs. The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished up 67 points at 12,086, led by a 3% rise in Alcoa shares. The S&P 500 gained 3 points to 1,297, led by a 1.4% jump in materials stocks. The Nasdaq Composite gained 14 points to 2,698.All comments contained herein are for informational purposes only, and should not be considered as a solicitation to buy or sell any security. The firm does not guarantee the accuracy or completeness of the information or make any warranties regarding results from it's usage.