Sector Investing

[ReturntoSender]

From Briefing.com: 4:10 pm : The stock market finished the Wednesday session on a sharply higher note, with the Nasdaq Composite (+1.7%) in the lead.

Equity indices held solid gains into the afternoon, with a second push coming after the release of the FOMC Minutes from the March policy meeting. For the most part, the minutes reiterated several points that were already known, but market participants zeroed in on a specific portion that commented on the expected trajectory of the fed funds rate.

Specifically, the minutes revealed that policymakers are not necessarily committed to hiking the fed funds rate in the first half of 2015. While that timetable could still come to fruition, it is becoming increasingly clear that the FOMC is unwilling to back itself into a corner by providing calendar-based guidance. That proved to be a relief for the stock and bond markets, while pressuring the dollar.

Treasuries cut the bulk of their losses after the release of the minutes, with the benchmark 10-yr yield ending at 2.69% after hovering near 2.72% in the early afternoon. Elsewhere, the Dollar Index (-0.3%) slumped to lows, while gold futures recovered their losses, clawing back to the 1309.00/ozt level.

Eight of ten sectors posted gains, with health care (+2.1%) ending in the lead after showing strength throughout the session. Since the advance was powered by many of the recent laggards, it is not a stretch to suspect that short covering fueled a significant part of the rally.

Biotechnology was a big contributor to the gains in health care as the iShares Nasdaq Biotechnology ETF (IBB 235.08, +9.25) surged 4.1%. It is worth mentioning that the strength of biotech also gave a boost to the Nasdaq.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq also received support from many recently-battered momentum names. Facebook (FB 62.41, +4.22) and LinkedIn (LNKD 176.18, +7.08) surged 7.3% and 4.2%, respectively, while discretionary components Amazon.com (AMZN 331.80, +4.74) and Netflix (NFLX 353.03, +4.14) posted gains close to 1.3% apiece. The broader discretionary sector (+1.1%), meanwhile, ended in line with the S&P 500.

Although three of four top-weighted sectors fared as well, or better than, the benchmark index, financials (+0.9%) were a reluctant participant in the advance.

On the downside, telecom services (-0.7%) and utilities (-0.3%) were the only two sectors ending in the red.

Participation was a bit below average as less than 690 million shares changed hands at the NYSE.

Today's economic data was limited to the Wholesale Inventories report, which pointed to an increase of 0.5% in February after increasing an upwardly revised 0.8% (from 0.6%) in January. The Briefing.com consensus expected wholesale inventories to increase 0.5%. There were concerns that strong inventory growth in February would be the result of severe winter weather conditions. In theory, the extreme cold would keep shoppers away, which would result in more goods being left on the shelves. That notion has been debunked in just about all of the economic data over the last several weeks, including the February wholesale inventory data. Sales, which should have weakened from weather effects, increased 0.7% in February after falling 1.8% in January.

Tomorrow, weekly initial claims (Briefing.com consensus 325K) and March Import/Export Prices will be released at 8:30 ET, while the Treasury Budget for March (Briefing.com consensus -$36.0 billion) will cross the wires at 14:00 ET.

S&P 500 +1.3% YTD
Nasdaq Composite +0.2% YTD
Russell 2000 -0.1% YTD
Dow Jones Industrial Average -0.8% YTD

DJ30 +181.04 NASDAQ +70.91 SP500 +20.22 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 2064/1.82 bln/675 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 2241/688.2 mln/806

3:30 pm :

Precious metals traded lower today as investors awaited the release of FOMC Minutes.
June gold dipped to a session low of $1301.10 per ounce in morning action and settled with a 0.3% loss at $1305.70 per ounce.
May silver fell as low as $19.60 per ounce in early morning action and then consolidated near the $19.75 per ounce level. It eventually settled 1.5% lower at $19.77 per ounce.
May crude oil extended yesterday's gains following bullish gasoline data. The EIA reported a build of 4.030 mln barrels in crude oil inventories for the week ending Apr 4 when consensus called for a smaller build of 0.8-1.3 mln barrels. However, gasoline inventories had a draw of 5.188 mln barrels vs expectations for a draw of 0.7-1.0 mln. The energy component lifted from its session low of $102.37 per barrel and brushed a session high of $103.77 per barrel before settling with a 1.0% gain at $103.58 per barrel.
May natural gas slipped to a session low of $4.50 per MMBtu in morning floor trade but quickly recovered back into positive territory. It advanced to a session high of $4.59 per MMbtu and settled with a 1.1% gain at $4.58 per MMbtu.

4:56PM Rudolph Tech announces favorable ruling in patent infringement lawsuit against Camtek (CAMT) (RTEC) 11.03 +0.18 : Co announced another favorable ruling in its ongoing patent infringement suit against Israeli manufacturer, Camtek, Ltd. On March 31, 2014, Judge John R. Tunheim ruled in Rudolph's favor finding that Camtek's Falcon products infringed Rudolph's US patent no. 6,826,298, which covers continuous inspection of wafers using strobing illumination.

Rudolph will petition the court to reinstate a permanent injunction against the sale by Camtek of its infringing semiconductor inspection systems. Rudolph also anticipates that the damages originally awarded by the jury in 2009 will be reinstated, as well as related interest and all subsequently awarded damages. A subsequent lawsuit has additionally been filed by Rudolph, alleging infringement of Rudolph's US patent no. 7,729,528, also for an Automated Wafer Defect Inspection System And A Process Of Performing Such Inspection, by each of Camtek's current inspection tool offerings.

4:02PM LSI Logic stockholders approve acquisition by Avago Technologies (AVGO) at $11.15 per share (LSI) 11.06 +0.00 :

Large Cap Gainers

REGN (301.41 +5.23%): Rebound following recent weakness in large cap biotech stocks: CELG, ACT also higher
FB (60.99 +4.81%): EconomicTimes reporting co has 100 mln users in India; FTC approved acquisition of WhatsApp; Adweek reporting Q1 ad pricing is up 10% sequentially
AA (12.93 +3.19%): Beat quarterly EPS by $0.04 ($0.09 vs $0.05 estimate), revs fell 6.5% yoy to $5.45 bln vs $5.55 blne stimate; target raised to $15 from $14 at Stifel; target raised to $12 from $11 at Cowen

Large Cap Losers

ISRG (457.25 -6.65%): Sees Q1 revs of ~$465 mln vs $536.6 mln estimate; initiated with an Underperform at Sterne Agee; mentioned cautiously at Canaccord Genuity
APA (82.93 -2.64%): Downgraded to Hold from Buy at Deutsche Bank
HSY (99.06 -2.62%): Downgraded to Sell from Neutral at Goldman

Mid Cap Gainers

PCRX (71.79 +9.69%): Priced public offering of 1.6 mln shares at $64 per share
ATHL (36.6 +9.12%): Announced $873 mln acquisition of producing properties and undeveloped acreage on the western side of the northern Midland Basin in Martin, Upton, Andrews, and Glasscock counties
TECD (65.5 +6.52%): Beat quarterly EPS by $0.15 ($2.10 vs $1.95 estimate), revs rose 7.1% yoy to $7.97 bln vs $8 bln estimate; sees year-over-year sales growth of mid-single-digits in the Americas and low-single-digits in Europe

Mid Cap Losers

EBR (3.07 -7.96%): Weakness in Brazilian mid-cap stocks: SID, ELP, CIG also lower
APOL (28.44 -4.27%): Reports reporting that Senator Marco Rubio will introduce income share agreements for use in education
EA (27.59 -3.98%): Gaming developers trading lower on NYPost report that Amazon is looking to hire game developers; TTWO also lower

12:20PM Hewlett-Packard announces settlement with DOJ and SEC; co will pay ~ $108 mln to these two U.S. government agencies; agrees to undertake certain compliance, reporting and cooperation obligations (HPQ) 32.55 +0.10 : Co announced a resolution of a DOJ and SEC investigation of potential violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA). HP will pay approximately $108 million to these two U.S. government agencies. HP also has agreed to undertake certain compliance, reporting and cooperation obligations.

11:49AM Stocks/ETFs that traded to new 52 week highs/lows this session - New highs (63) outpacing new lows (28) (SCANX) : Stocks that traded to 52 week highs: AEP, ASMI, ATI, AXAS, BAM, BFR, BUD, BXP, CART, CLR, CM, CNQ, CNX, CQH, CQP, CWEI, DMLP, ECA, EPD, ERF, ESCA, GAS, GGAL, GPOR, GSJK, HCSG, HIL, HST, IM, IMO, ITRN, KED, KEP, KMB, KND, MMP, MSM, NEE, NOA, NRG, NS, NYLD, ONNN, ORAN, PBA, PFIS, RDNT, REMY, SEM, SLCA, SLG, SNP, SUP, SYX, TD, TECD, TFSL, TOT, TTM, UL, VNO, WR, YONG

Stocks that traded to 52 week lows: AEPI, AKBA, ALAN, AQXP, ASTI, ATEN, ATOS, BRDR, CBSO, CCCL, CDE, CHCI, CRCM, CRMB, EGT, INTG, NEWL, ONE, PRAN, QTWO, RJET, TBNK, TECUA, TWMC, UEC, VRNS, VSAR, VVUS

ETFs that traded to 52 week highs: EWC, GULF, JJA, USCI, XLU

ETFs that traded to 52 week lows: none


Peregrine Semiconductor (PSMI) announced the Greater China debut of UltraCMOS Global 1, the industry's first reconfigurable RF front-end system, at EDI CON 2014.

Silicon Labs (SLAB) introduced a new 32-bit hardware and firmware development kit designed to accelerate the design of Made for AAPL iPod/iPhone/iPad accessories and help product manufacturers get to market quickly.

Integrated Silicon Solution (ISSI) announced it has begun sampling production units of its new 1 Gigabit Low Power DDR2 products. These devices are the IS43LD32320A and the IS46LD32320A, organized as 32Mx32, and the IS43LD16640A and the IS46LD16640A, organized as 64Mx16. These devices are packaged in a 134-ball BGA, and also available is the 168-pin PoP BGA. The IS46 series represents a full range of automotive grade products.

NXP Semiconductors N.V. (NXPI) announced its investment in Senseg, the leader in next-generation spatial haptic feedback technology. The investment is part of NXP's drive to lead in new user interface technologies for mobile, consumer and automotive applications. Existing investors in Senseg also participated in this Series B round.