Day Traders Diary

5/14/10

U.S. stocks opened steeply lower on Friday with Europe's debt debacle over-shadowing better than expected U.S. retail sales in April. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 95 points to 10,687. The S&P 500 Index shed 12 points to 1,144. The S&P 500 Index declined 30 points to 2,363. It looks like we're in the midst of a correction. In the financial space Visa and Mastercard are both down 7% after Senate voted in favor of a measure that would allow the Federal Reserve to regulate fees on credit and debit cards. The big banks like Citigroup, JP Morgan, and Bank of America who are heavy into the credit card business are also lower. Credit Suisse is down 4% on a downgrade. Legg Mason is modestly higher on an upgrade. In the tech space, Google resumes its downward trend. Nothing is looking particularly good. Nvidia is down 10% even though they beat earnings estimates. Netgear, Amazon, Ebay, and Yahoo were upgraded, but only Yahoo is higher. In the retail space Dillards is jumping 10% after beating earnings estimates. Blockbuster is down 20% on concerns the company is facing bankruptcy. Netflix is down 6% on two downgrades. Office Depot is down 3% even though the stock was upgraded. After the first half an hour the Dow fell over 150 points before recovering. The Nasdaq fell 40 points. Here we go again. Through the morning the Dow pushed lower falling 180 points. The Nasdaq declined 57 points. Nothing really looks good. In the afternoon more of the same. The Dow fell over 200 points. The Nasdaq declined 60 points. Nothing looks good. In the last hour the Dow fell over 250 points before recovering into the close, similar to last Friday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 162 points, or 1.5%, to finish at 10,620. For the week, the Dow still gained 2.3%. The S&P 500 index dropped 21 points, or 1.9%, to 1,135, while the Nasdaq Composite fell 47 points, or 2%, to 2,346. The S&P gained 2.2% for the week and the Nasdaq rose 3.6%.

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