From Briefing.com: 4:35 pm : More than 95% of the names in the S&P 500 logged losses today. Their weakness was underpinned by renewed concerns about a rate hike in China, the state of finances in Ireland, and Greece's ability to tighten its fiscal practices.
Stocks opened trade in the red as the prior session's late slide extended into premarket trade with help from a 4% plunge by China's Shanghai Composite. Selling there was stoked by speculation that a rate hike may be in the offing since Korea raised its target rate. Many are fearful that tighter monetary policy in China would not only soften demand in the country, but also stymie global growth.
Also in the backdrop was worry about the financial health of Ireland and its banks. The country's prime minister stated in a CNBC report that the country's banks are meeting European Central Bank funding requirements and that the country has not had to ask for aid.
The tone of trade further weakened with word that Austria has opted to withhold bailout funds for Greece because it may miss its deficit reduction target.
The dollar was helped by that headline. Buying in the currency was strong enough to take the greenback more than 1% higher to its best level since September before it eased back to end the trading day with a gain of about 0.9%. However, the greenback's gain only exacerbated weakness among stocks.
Selling was so sharp that the S&P 500 was pushed through initial support levels to the 1173 line, which was last touched in October. Even though it finished off of its low, the S&P 500 still suffered its worst single-session percentage loss since August.
The Dow had dropped more than 200 points to violate the 11,000 line before it attempted to pare its loss. Among its 30-members, only WalMart (WMT 54.26, +0.31) and Home Depot (HD 31.71, +0.32) booked gains. Home Depot satisfied investors with an upside earnings surprise and a strong outlook.
WalMart's latest quarter was not too inspiring, but the company did issue a strong forecast. Strength in the pair, along with solid results from a handful of smaller retailers, helped limit losses among retailers to 0.6%, collectively.
In addition to stocks, traders also cut down commodities. That left the CRB Commodity Index to lose 3.2% after it lost 3.6% this past Friday. The CRB is now down 7.6% from the two-year high that it set last week.
Treasuries attracted support after they fell under a concerted midday selling effort. Their slide coincided with the dollar's initial bounce. In the end, though, the benchmark 10-year Note gained a full point to take its yield down to 2.84% after it hit 2.9%, its highest level since August, in the prior session. The 30-year Bond pushed up more than two points so that its yield slid to 4.27% after it was at a six-month high of about 4.42% just yesterday.
Data for today did nothing to offer support to stocks. The October Producer Price Index increased 0.4%, which is more tepid than the 0.8% increase that had been expected among economists polled by Briefing.com. Core prices actually fell 0.6%, which contrasts with the consensus call for a 0.1% increase.
Additionally, industrial production was unchanged in October. It had been expected to increase 0.3% after a 0.2% decline in the prior month. Capacity utilization remained steady at 74.8%, as generally expected.
Headlines of the day brought plenty of participants into the fold. In turn, trading volume on the NYSE totaled more than 1.3 billion shares. That is far more than the paltry tally of 880 million shares that exchanged hands on the Big Board in the prior session.
Advancing Sectors: (None)
Declining Sectors: Materials (-2.2%), Energy (-2.1%), Tech (-1.9%), Financials (-1.8%), Telecom (-1.6%), Industrials (-1.6%), Health Care (-1.3%), Consumer Discretionary (-1.3%), Utilities (-1.2%), Consumer Staples (-1.1%)DJ30 -178.47 NASDAQ -43.98 NQ100 -1.8% R2K -2.0% SP400 -1.8% SP500 -19.41 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 548/2.25 bln/2103 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 405/1.35 bln/2642
12:21PM Semiconductor Hldrs hovering slightly under its morning bounce high at 30.08 (SMH) 30.03 +0.29 : The SMH has displayed relative strength vs. the S&P for much of the session. And as noted, while the Dow, XLB, XLF, KRE all reached back to their 50 day averages, the SMH has thus far been able to hold near its 20 day ema and above last week's low at 29.86/29.74 (session low 29.82).
09:26 am JinkoSolar Holding target raised to $43 at Collins Stewart: . Collins Stewart raises their JKS tgt to $43 from $34 saying they recently had been restricted on JKS since before it reported 3Q10 results. This note updates their forecast to reflect the impact of those results, which were well above their prior forecast, its recent secondary offering, and its accelerated capacity expansion plan. JKS now expects to have 600MW of vertically integrated capacity online by December 2010, up from prior outlook for 500MW. Firm says their CY11 forecast is now based on JKS shipping 615MW, up from 470MW in prior forecast.
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