Day Traders Diary

9/22/11

U.S. stocks open sharply lower following the Fed's comments indicating there are significant downside risks to the economic outlook. These comments also sent the major averages around the World down 3% to 6% overnight. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 353 points to 10,771. The Standard & Poor's 500 fell 36 points to 1,130. The Nasdaq Composite Index shed 75 points to 2,462. Not much looks good this morning. Red Hat had strong earnings and actually is trading up 4%. Bed Bath and Beyond is actually higher as well following strong earnings. The retail space in general is holding up. Best Buy is trading higher. Interestingly, Best Buy's stock symbol is similar to Bed Bath & Beyond. DSW and Decker Outdoors were upgraded, but both stocks are lower. Urban Outfitters is down 3% on a downgrade. Vail Resorts is down 8% following earnings. The financials are lower surprise, surprise. Bank of Montreal is down 4% following earnings. Discover is actually modestly higher following earnings. The techs are holding up or trying to hold up. Yahoo is modestly higher on an upgrade. Broadcom was upgraded, but the stock is down 4%. Intel is only modestly lower on an upgrade. Through the first hour the averages tried to rebound with only limited success. Through the morning the averages made new lows. Honeywell reaffirmed numbers, but it isn't helping. The stock is down 5%. FedEx beat estimates, but the stock is getting hit by 8%. Investors are in a selling mood. In the afternoon the averages remained weak. Every rally is met by more selling. The Dow fell over 500 points and the Nasdaq dropped 100 points before recovering a little in the last hour. Into the close, finally the shorts started to cover. The Dow average finished down 391 points, or 3.5%, at 10,733, its biggest loss since Aug. 18. All 30 Dow stocks ended lower. The S&P 500 fell 37 points, or 3.2%, to 1,129. The resource and energy sectors suffered the most among the index's 10 groups, declining more than 5% each. The Nasdaq Composite lost 82 points, or 3.3%, to 2,455.

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