Day Traders Diary

5/6/10

U.S. stocks opened lower on Thursday, extending losses into a third day, as investors weighed the ongoing financial trouble in Europe. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 10 points to 10,857. The S&P 500 Index declined 2 points to 1,163. The Nasdaq Composite was off 4 points to 2,398.
The retail sector is reporting April same store sales that are coming in more or less in-line with expectations. Most of the retailers are lower. Aeropostale, Target, Big Lots, and Costco are down 3% or more. Dress Barn is jumping 5%. On the earnings front Dr Pepper Snapple, El Paso, Cigna, Diageo, MGM Mirage, Cedar Fair, and Vale are higher following numbers. Sara Lee, Liz Claiborne, Urban Outfitters, Alcatel Lucent, Cablevision, Pinnacle West Frontier are modestly lower following earnings. After the first half an hour the averages started to recover lead by the techs. Google, Apple, IBM, and Cisco are modestly higher. As the morning progressed the averages sold back off. The Dow fell 65 points to 10800. The Nasdaq declined 14 points. During the lunch hour the Dow fell 100 points. The Nasdaq declined 30 points. Very few stocks are in the green. In the tech space IBM and Google are in the green. As the afternoon progressed the averages pushed lower. The Dow sank 170 points. The Nasdaq fell 50 points. The financials are getting wholloped on fears of more banking regulation. Then between 2 o'clock and 3 o'clock we had the weirdest hour in my career. The Dow dropped 700 points in 15 minutes, then recovered 600 points in 20 minutes. So the Dow fell over 200 points and accelerated dropping nearly 1000 points before recovering due to a human trading error. Crazy. In the last hour the market remained jittery as investors tried to figure out what had just happened. The Dow finished down 347 points, or 3.2%, at 10,520. The S&P 500 Index shed 37 points, or 3.2%, to 1,128. The Nasdaq Composite Index declined 82 points, or 3.4%, to 2,319.64.

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