Day Traders Diary

1/19/10

U.S. stocks shed opening losses to turn mildly up on Tuesday as investors braced for corporate earnings including results from IBM after the close. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 9 points to 10,619. The S&P 500 added 2 points to 1,148. The Nasdaq Composite Index gained 8 points to 2,316. So far the techs look good. IBM is making a new high ahead of earnings tonight. Sandisk, Apple, Ciena, Google, and Micron all received upgrades. All are trading higher. Apple reports earnings tomorrow. The financials opened lower, except for a few. TD Ameritrade is up 4% after reporting earnings this morning. Citigroup is unchanged on in line earnings. Genworth, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo all received cautious analyst comments causing the stock to open lower. However all three recovered after the first hour. After the first hour the averages kicked in, rallying 80 points in the Dow and 20 points in the Nasdaq. In the commodity space, U.S. Steel is up 4% on an upgrade. The fertilizers are lower even though Potash was upgraded. In the retail space Lowes, Home Depot, and McDonalds were all upgrded. All three are higher. Burger King is lower on a downgrade. On the earnings front Parker-Hannifin and Tyco, and Forest Labs are all higher after beating estimates. On the merger front Cadbury did an about face and agreed to a merger with Kraft. Cadbury is up 5% while Kraft is down a percent. Through the morning and into the afternoon the Dow rose over 100 points. The Nasdaq rallied 26 points. Through the afternoon and into the last hour the averages remained strong getting back most of the losses on Friday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished up 115 points at 10,725. The S&P 500 Index added 14 points to 1,150. The Nasdaq Composite climbed 32 points to 2,320.

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