Day Traders Diary

5/18/09

U.S. stocks shot higher at Monday's start, thanks to a plethora of upgrades and better than expected earnings from Lowes, our featured stock of the week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 105 points, or 1.3%, to 8,374. The S&P 500 rose 10 points to 893. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 17 points to 1,697. The research analysts are in a good mood this morning upgrading a number of industries and companies. Lowes is lifting the retail sector, jumping 7% on earnings. Home Depot is up 5% ahead of their earnings tomorrow. Dillards is up 19% after reporting last Friday night. The analysts in the retail sector upgraded Aeropostale, Macys, and J. Crew. All three are higher. The financials are performing well this morning. Bank of Amercia is up 8% thanks to a big upgrade from Goldman Sachs. Plenty of upgrades and positive comments from the analyst community regarding the financials. Stifel is making positive comments on Wells Fargo, USB, and Bank of America regarding a recovery. All three are higher. We learned over the weekend that Warren Buffett increased his stack in Wells in the first quarter. JMP Securities upgraded Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs. Both are higher. American Express is up 2% on an upgrade. The tech sector looks good this morning. Broadcom, Micron, Marvell, and McAfee are all higher on upgrades. Only Google among the big techs is lower. After the first hour the Dow was up 100 points. The Nasdaq rose 13 points. Through the morning the averages slowly improved. In the lunch hour, the Dow rose 150 points. The Nasdaq rose 28 points. Even Google turned around. Entering the last hour, the Dow was at the highs of the day, up 200 points. The Nasdaq rose 43 points. No pull back today. The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished up 235 points, or 2.9%, at 8,504. The S&P 500 Index rose 26 points, or 3%, to 909. The Nasdaq Composite advanced 52 points, or 3.1%, to 1,732.

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