From Briefing.com: 4:20 pm : Stocks started the day higher but were only able to hold a portion of their gains in a session which saw two pullbacks to the unchanged line. After spending most of the day in the black, the S&P 500 ended higher by 0.2%.
Telecoms were broadly higher as indicated by the iShares Dow Jones US Telecom ETF (IYZ 25.22, +0.29), which added 1.2%. MetroPCS (PCS 10.31, +0.25) advanced 2.5% on rumors regarding a possible merger with another major carrier. Meanwhile, Sprint (S 5.10, +0.10) and Verizon (VZ 44.89, +0.65) settled higher by 2.0% and 1.5%, respectively.
The Dow Jones Transportation Average has been on a steady rise over the past week, and it added another 0.8% today. Airline stocks showed strength as Delta (DAL 9.50, +0.22), Southwest (LUV 9.18, +0.23), and United Continental (UAL 20.31, +0.51) all posted gains between 2.3% and 2.6%. Shipping and trucking stocks were also higher as Overseas Shipholding Group (OSG 6.72, +0.34) and Landstar (LSTR 49.62, +0.94) advanced 5.3% and 1.9%, respectively.
Financial stocks outperformed the broader market as banks continued adding to their recent gains. Goldman Sachs (GS 118.24, +1.55), JPMorgan Chase (JPM 39.92, +0.32), and Citigroup (C 33.05, +0.39) all gained near 1.0%. Meanwhile, Bank of America (BAC 8.97, -0.06) lagged the other majors with a 0.7% loss. European financials were also on the rise with Credit Suisse (CS 22.55, +1.06) and UBS (UBS 12.82, +0.26) ending higher by 4.9% and 2.1%, respectively. On the downside, Deutsche Bank (DB 42.43, -0.19) slipped 0.5% after rallying more than 55.0% since July 25th.
Chinese internet stocks were on the move after Citigroup initiated coverage of three names. Youku (YOKU 18.79, +0.94) and Sohu.com (SOHU 42.50, +1.50) received a ‘buy' rating and gained 5.3% and 3.7%, respectively. Meanwhile, Renren (RENN 3.81, +0.04) added 1.1% despite receiving a ‘sell' rating. Elsewhere, Yahoo! (YHOO 15.40, +0.24) rose by 1.6% as the company is expected to acquire the assets of online business-to-business trading platform, Alibaba, by the end of the week.
Shares of Facebook (FB 20.93, +1.50) jumped 7.7% after Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg participated in a Q&A session at an event in San Francisco last evening. At the event, Mr. Zuckerberg commented on mobile ads, saying that they are performing better than the ones which appear on the desktop platform. In addition, Zuckerberg called Zynga (ZNGA 3.07, +0.28) a "fundamentally strong company." Shares of ZNGA spiked 10.0% in response to the comments.
Export prices, excluding agriculture, increased by 0.4% in August after they had decreased by 1.4% in the prior month. Excluding oil, import prices were down in August by 0.2%, which follows a 0.3% decrease experienced in the prior month.
Separately, wholesale inventories were up 0.7% in July. That is higher than the increase of 0.3% which had been broadly forecast.
Tomorrow's key economic events include the Federal Open Market Committee announcing its statement and rate decision at 12:30 ET, and its economic projections at 14:00 ET. Finally, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke will hold a press conference at 14:15 ET.
A handful of economic data points are scheduled to be released tomorrow. Initial and continuing claims, as well as PPI and core PPI will be released at 8:30 ET while the U.S. Treasury will report its budget at 14:00 ET.
The U.S. Treasury will hold a $13 billion, 30-yr reopening.DJ30 +9.99 NASDAQ +9.78 SP500 +3.00 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1467/1.65 bln/990 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 1965/663.7 mln/1043
3:30 pm : Crude oil touched a session high of $97.49 per barrel in morning action but slid to a session low of $96.30 per barrel following weaker-than-anticipated inventory data that showed a build of 1.994 mln barrels when a draw of 2.8 mln barrels was expected. The energy component then chopped around slightly below the breakeven line and settled just 3 cents lower at $97.01 per barrel.
Natural gas dipped to a session low of $2.95 per MMBtu in morning floor trade but rallied back into positive territory in afternoon action. It settled with a 2.3% gain at $3.06 per MMBtu, or just below its session high of $3.07 per MMBtu.
Precious metals traded higher in overnight action as the dollar index fell following the German Constitutional Court's ruling rejecting the injunction against the ESM. However, the momentum faded and both gold and silver fell into negative territory in morning pit action.
Gold dipped to a session low of $1728.50 per ounce and spent the remainder of its session trading in a consolidative pattern just below the unchanged line. It eventually settled 0.1% lower at $1733.40 per ounce. Silver attempted to erase losses after it fell to a session low of $32.51 per ounce. Despite inching higher, the metal settled with a 1.0% loss at $33.26 per ounce.DJ30 +12.24 NASDAQ +1.67 SP500 +1.86 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1235/1391.6 mln/1203 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 1801/452 mln/1196
4:32PM SunPower extends long-standing partnership with Toshiba (SPWR) 4.80 +0.04 : Co announced that it has extended its long-standing partnership with Toshiba for the next several years. Under the terms of the master supply agreement, Toshiba will place orders of more than 100-megawatts (MW) for SunPower's high efficiency solar panels to support the rapidly growing residential solar market in Japan. Since SunPower first partnered with Toshiba in 2010, it has delivered approximately 70 MW of its high-performance solar panels.
2:40PM Apple confirms new iPod touch and iPod nano (AAPL) 663.95 +3.37 : Co introduced the new lineup of the world's most popular music players including the all-new iPod touch and reinvented iPod nano. The new iPod touch is the thinnest iPod touch ever and features a brilliant 4-inch Retina display; a 5 megapixel iSight camera with 1080p HD video recording; Apple's A5 chip; Siri, the intelligent assistant; and iOS 6, the world's most advanced mobile operating system. The new iPod touch comes in a new ultra-thin and light anodized aluminum design, and for the first time ever, iPod touch comes in five vibrant colors. The new iPod nano is the thinnest iPod ever featuring a 2.5-inch Multi-Touch display; convenient navigation buttons; built-in Bluetooth for wireless listening; and the new iPod nano comes in seven new colors.
2:21PM Apple confirms new iTunes for Mac and PC (AAPL) 663.29 +2.70 : Co announced the new iTunes for Mac and PC featuring a redesigned player, seamless integration with iCloud, and anew look for the online music, apps, TV and movie stores. The new iTunes is coming in October and will feature a simpler and cleaner interface that keeps iTunes content at the forefront.
2:03PM Apple confirms introduction of iPhone 5 (AAPL) 662.89 +2.30 : Co announced iPhone 5, the thinnest and lightest iPhone ever, completely redesigned to feature a new 4-inch Retina display; an Apple-designed A6 chip for blazing fast performance; and ultrafast wireless technology. iPhone 5 comes with iOS 6 with over 200 new features including: the all new Maps app with Apple-designed cartography and turn-by-turn navigation; Facebook integration; Passbook organization; and more Siri features and languages. iPhone 5 comes in either white & silver or black & slate, and will be available in the US for a suggested retail price of $199 for the 16GB model and $299 for the 32GB model and $399 for the 64GB model. iPhone 5 will be available from the Apple Online Store, Apple's retail stores, and through AT&T (T), Sprint (S), Verizon Wireless (VZ) and select Apple Authorized Resellers. iPhone 5 will be available in the US, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore and the UK on Friday, September 21, and customers can pre-order their iPhone 5 beginning Friday, September 14. iPhone 4S will also be available for $99 and iPhone 4 will be available for free with a two-year contract. iPhone 5 will roll out worldwide to 22 more countries on September 28.
Maxim Integrated Products (MXIM) has established a Corporate Venture Group to invest in startup companies and innovative technologies.
8:02AM Ramtron: Cypress Semiconductor (CY) extends tender offer to acquire RMTR to Sep 25 2012 (RMTR) 2.89 : Cypress's offer represents a 59% premium over Ramtron's closing price of $1.81 per share on June 11, 2012, the day before Cypress publicly disclosed its offer for Ramtron. Except for the extension of the expiration date, all other terms and conditions of the offer remain unchanged. The all-cash offer is not conditioned on due diligence or financing.
Texas Instruments (TXN $28.45 -0.13) narrowed its third quarter revenue outlook to $3.27-3.41 billion versus $3.3 bln consensus, raises bottom end of EPS guidance to $0.45-0.49, excluding $0.07 in charges (noted in the company's most recent earnings release) vs $0.45 consensus, up from $0.41-0.49, excluding $0.07 in charges.
Mizuho notes Intel (INTC $23.40 +0.26) kicked off its 2012 developer forum on Tuesday in San Francisco. The company continued to highlight its focus on the ultrabook category of PCs and remained optimistic about the various form factors that will soon be available. INTC expects its 22nm Haswell processor to provide improved performance at lower power consumption and showcased emerging applications such as voice and gesture recognition and smart, secure payments. They remain positive on MLNX given its exposure to the HPC markets and its leadership position in InfiniBand; they note the co reaffirmed this week.
10:45 am Information Technology shares rise and are in line with broader market today
The tech sector is trading higher today, along with gains in the broader market. Semiconductors are showing relative strength with the SOX trading 0.5% higher. Within the chip index, STM (+5.3%) is a notable standout. Among other major indices, the SPY is trading 0.3% higher today, while the QQQ and the NASDAQ are trading 0.2% higher on the session. Among tech bellwethers, FB (+5.8%) is showing notable strength following Zuckerberg's interview last night.
In tech earnings, TXN (-0.5%) narrowed its Q3 rev guidance inline with consensus. Elsewhere, GCOM (-18.8%) posted a Q4 beat and issued downside guidance and XRTX (-11.6%) preannounced downside Q3 resutls. In news, FB (+5.8%) CEO Zuckerberg presented at the Disrupt conference after the close. He said that Wall St. is underestimating the Co's potential in mobile. Also, STEC (-4.8%) disclosed that PwC has resigned as its auditor. Among rumors, AOL (+1.5%) has spoken to Marissa Mayer about possible YHOO (+2.0%) merger, according to reports.
In notable analyst upgrades this morning in the tech space, SYNC (+1.2%) was upgraded to Neutral at Citigroup and RCI (+2.7%) was upgraded to Buy from Neutral at BofA/Merrill. Among downgrades, Needham downgraded SYNA (-6.2%) to Hold, and ADP (-1.3%) & PAYX (-0.6%) were downgraded to Underperform at Jefferies. There are no notable names in tech scheduled to report quarterly results today after the close. However, AAPL (-0.2%) is holding an event at 1 ET at which the company is expected to unveil its newest iPhone.
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