From Briefing.com: 4:20 pm : All the whipsaw action earlier this week left participants subdued for most of the week's final session. That left stocks to spend most of the session trading listlessly in a tight range.
Participants were generally unmoved by the revised fourth quarter GDP numbers. The headline growth rate was upwardly revised to reflect 5.9% annualized growth rate, which exceeded expectations, but the personal consumption component increased at a softer-than-expected clip of 1.7%. Core personal consumption expenditures increased at a faster-than-expected quarter-over-quarter clip of 1.6%, though.
The rest of the morning's economic data also failed to lift the mood of market participants. Specifically, existing home sales for January made a surprise 7.2% month-over-month drop to an annualized rate of 5.05 million units. Meanwhile, the final February Consumer Sentiment Survey from University of Michigan was little changed at 73.6 and in-line with expectations.
During recent months weakness in the dollar has been cause for stock market gains, but participants shrugged off the dollar's latest dip. The greenback had gyrated in the early going as the euro garnered support as news that United Kingdom GDP was upwardly revised overshadowed the latest batch of headlines regarding Greece's fiscal woes. The greenback eventually rolled over to finish with a 0.5% loss against competing currencies.
Financials attempted to provide the stock market with a late lift, but the move lost momentum into the close. Still, JPMorgan Chase (JPM 41.97, +1.33) led the financial sector to a 0.7% gain, which was better than that of any other major sector. Though there was no specific news item to account for strength in JPM, it was still able to put together its best single-session percentage gain in more than three months.
AIG (AIG 24.77, -2.74) was a laggard in the financial sector. The booked its worst single-session loss by percent in nearly three months after its latest quarterly results proved disappointing.
In other earnings news, a better-than-expected bottom line from Gap (GPS 21.50, +1.11) helped shares of the retailer put together their best single-session percentage gain since September.
Though the broader market was able to eke out a gain, it wasn't enough to turn stocks positive for the week. Instead, the S&P 500 settled with a weekly loss of 0.4%. Despite that slip, the stock market finished February with a 2.8% monthly gain.
Trading volume on the NYSE exceeded both its 50-day moving average and its 200-day moving average as more than 1.5 billion shares exchanged hands on the big board.
Commodities finished the month on a strong note. As such, the CRB Commodity Index finished the session with a 1.2% gain, which helped drive a 3.5% monthly gain.
Treasuries had a relatively quiet session. Though the benchmark 10-year Note settled off of its high, it still netted a few ticks to push its yield back toward 3.60%.
Advancing Sectors: Financials (+0.7%), Industrials (+0.4%), Consumer Discretionary (+0.2%), Energy (+0.2%), Telecom (+0.2%), Health Care (+0.1%), Tech (+0.1%)
Declining Sectors: Utilities (-0.7%), Consumer Staples (-0.5%)
Unchanged: MaterialsDJ30 +4.23 NASDAQ +4.04 NQ100 +0.3% R2K -0.3% SP400 +0.1% SP500 +1.55 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1231/2.26 bln/1420 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 1804/1.25 bln/1219
4:19PM LDK Solar acquires Best Solar's crystalline module manufacturing plant at cash consideration of $21.5 mln (LDK) 6.19 +0.02 : Co announced that it has entered into an agreement to acquire the crystalline module manufacturing plant of Best Solar Co., Ltd. ("Best Solar"). Under the terms of the transaction LDK will acquire Best Solar's crystalline module manufacturing plant at cash consideration of $21.5 mln, representing the fair value of the assets acquired determined on an arms-length basis.
ChipMOS TECHNOLOGIES (IMOS) entered into a share purchase agreement with Siliconware Precision Industries (SPIL) to sell to SPIL Company's holding of 133,000,000 common shares of its wholly owned subsidiary, ChipMOS TECHNOLOGIES, with a consideration of approximately ~$51 mln. The purchased shares represent ~15.8% of the total number of ChipMOS Taiwan's outstanding shares. Under the terms and conditions of the Share Purchase Agreement, SPIL will pay the purchase price in four installments to the Company with the final installment scheduled to be paid on or about March 31, 2011.
8:01AM Broadcom authorized a new evergreen share repurchase program (BRCM) 31.40 : Co authorized a new evergreen share repurchase program under which it may repurchase shares of Broadcom's Class A common stock. Repurchases under this program are intended to reduce or eliminate the dilution associated with stock incentive plans. Repurchases under the new program will be made in open market or privately negotiated transactions. Broadcom expects to use cash on hand to fund the repurchases. The Board has not established an end date for the new repurchase program. The plan does not obligate Broadcom to acquire any particular amount of common stock, and it may be suspended at any time at the company's discretion. The evergreen share repurchase program may be complemented with an additional share repurchase program in the future.
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