From Briefing.com: 4:15 pm : The major averages registered modest gains with the Dow Jones Industrial Average leading the way, adding 0.8%. The Nasdaq eked out a gain of 0.2% while the S&P 500 climbed 0.5%.
After showing little change in the opening minutes of today's session, the three indices jumped to their highs in the wake of the May ISM report. Although the reading missed expectations, the disappointing data point was perceived as a sign the Federal Reserve will maintain its current accommodative policy course.
The brief spike was followed by a return to session lows as the Nasdaq and S&P 500 dipped into the red, where they spent most of the afternoon.
However, the Dow never saw red as Merck (MRK 48.45, +1.75) and Intel (INTC 25.24, +0.96) boosted the price-weighted index from the opening bell. Merck rose 3.8% after the company presented the interim results of one of its trials while Intel gained 4.0% following the weekend public debut of its fourth generation processors. Other chipmakers also saw gains as the PHLX Semiconductor Index advanced 0.5%.
Although the tech sector registered a slim gain, the tech-heavy Nasdaq trailed behind the other averages as biotechnology pressured the index throughout the day. The iShares Nasdaq Biotechnology ETF (IBB 177.43, -2.07) fell 1.2%.
While the afternoon rally enabled most sectors to erase their early losses, financials, homebuilders, and transportation-related stocks spectated from the sidelines.
Major financials displayed mixed performance as Bank of America (BAC 13.55, -0.11) fell 0.8% while Goldman Sachs (GS 163.56, +1.48) rose 0.9%. Meanwhile, the financial sector ended little changed.
Elsewhere, the weakness in homebuilders sent the SPDR S&P Homebuilders ETF (XHB 30.63, -0.27) back to its early May levels as the ETF lost 0.9%.
Finally, softness among airlines and truckers pressured the Dow Jones Transportation Average as the bellwether complex ended flat.
The CBOE Volatility Index (VIX 16.20, -0.10) ended in the red after climbing as high as 17.58% intraday.
Today's volume was well above average as 880 million shares changed hands on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange.
Looking at today's economic data, the ISM Manufacturing Index fell to 49.0 in May from 50.7 in April. That was the first contraction in the ISM Index since November 2012, and the lowest reading since June 2009. The Briefing.com consensus expected the index to increase modestly to 50.9.
Separately, construction spending increased 0.4% in April after declining an upwardly revised 0.8% (from -1.7%) in March. The Briefing.com consensus expected construction spending to increase 1.1%.
Residential construction, which was supposed to be a positive contributor to construction spending growth in April, fell 0.1%. The drop was the result of a sharp decline in home improvement spending (-3.2%).
Tomorrow's economic data will be limited to the 8:30 ET release of the April trade balance. The Briefing.com consensus expects a trade deficit of $41 billion to follow the March deficit of $38.8 billion.DJ30 +138.46 NASDAQ +9.46 SP500 +9.68 NASDAQ Adv/Vol/Dec 1459/1.96 bln/1019 NYSE Adv/Vol/Dec 1384/880.0 mln/1694
3:30 pm :
July crude oil steadily climbed higher during today's floor trade as it got support from a slide in the dollar index following data showing the ISM Manufacturing Index contracting for the first time since November 2012. The energy component lifted off its session low of $92.23 per barrel set in early morning floor trade and brushed a session high of $93.68 per barrel. It booked a 1.6% gain as it settled at $93.41 per barrel.
July natural gas climbed to a session high of $4.04 per MMBtu but lost momentum in afternoon floor trade. It erased all of its earlier gains as it settled the session unchanged at $3.98 per MMBtu.
Aug gold gained strength as the dollar index tumbled. The yellow metal took off from its session low of $1390.00 per ounce and rose as high as $1416.50 per ounce. It spent afternoon action trading just below that level and settled with a 1.3% gain at $1412.10 per ounce.
July silver rallied to a session high of $22.92 per ounce in late morning pit action after trading as low as $22.27 per ounce earlier in the session. It eventually settled at $22.73, booking a gain of 2.2%.
1:13PM DSP Group: ISS expresses concern about board leadership at DSP and recommends withholding votes from former Chairman Eliyahu Ayalon (DSPG) 7.93 -0.01 : Starboard Value, one of the largest shareholders of DSP Group, beneficially owning approximately 10.1% of its outstanding common stock, responded to the release of reports by proxy advisory firms Institutional Shareholder Services ("ISS") and Glass Lewis ("Glass Lewis") regarding Starboard's election contest at DSP. "We agree with ISS' concern regarding Board leadership at DSP, particularly the actions of former Chairman Ayalon. We, too, find the actions of the Board's leadership extremely troubling, including the Board's failure, according to ISS, 'to ensure that the two shareholder nominees appointed as part of the settlement in 2012 were also assigned to committees and fully integrated into board discussions.' We believe that despite the Board's recent reactionary actions the Board continues to resist necessary change at DSP. Therefore, we are encouraged that ISS has sought to address 'ongoing board reluctance to embrace a shareholder perspective' by recommending that DSP's shareholders WITHHOLD votes from former Chairman Ayalon at the upcoming annual meeting."
9:52AM Intel bucking the broader market opening weakness as price breaks out above its May range highs along 24.50 on an upgrade (INTC) 25.42 +1.14 :
Cree (CREE) reported it has surpassed a significant milestone in shipping over two million GaN High Electron Mobility Transistors for cellular telecommunications.
sTec (STEC) announced the sTec s3000 storage appliance. The s3000 combines the performance, reliability and endurance of sTec's solid-state drive technology with Microsoft (MSFT) Windows Storage Server 2012 storage clustering, virtualization and management features.
8:32AM Altera raises quarterly dividend to $0.15 from $0.10, new annual yield 1.8% (ALTR) 33.19 :
8:09AM Microchip subsidiary SST and Novocell Semiconductor announce acquisition of Novocell by SST; transaction is expected to be immediately accretive on a non-GAAP basis (MCHP) 36.48 : Co announced that Microchip and SST have signed a definitive agreement to acquire Novocell. The acquisition was approved by the Boards of Directors of each company and is being announced today at the 2013 Design Automation Conference (DAC) in Austin, Texas. The terms of the deal are confidential. The transaction is expected to close in early June 2013 and is expected to be immediately accretive on a non-GAAP basis.
F5 Networks (FFIV 82.40, -0.81) is off by 1.0% after Morgan Stanley downgraded the stock to 'Equal-Weight' from 'Overweight.'
7:47AM SunEdison: MEMC Electonic Materials (formerly WFR) has changed its name to SunEdison, effective today (SUNE) 8.07 :
PMC (PMCS) announced the industry's first low-profile, 24-port, PCIe Gen3 6Gb/s SAS/SATA RAID adapter, enabling new dense architectures for scale-out or space-limited data centers.
ARM (ARMH) announced an optimized IP solution designed to power the 580 million mid-range mobile devices expected over the next two years. The mid-range market is projected to exceed the number of premium smartphones and tablets beginning in 2015.
09:09 am Intel upgraded to Outperform at FBR Capital; tgt raised to $28: . FBR upgrades INTC to Outperform from Mkt Perform and raises its tgt to $28 from $23. On the eve of Computex and the public debut for "Haswell," FBR acknowledges the challenges ahead for Intel in the PC market, but now believes the Co has added more than enough new avenues of growth to replace lost PC units. Additionally, in its discussions with engineers intimately involved in the handset design process, they have unanimously expressed a renewed interest in Intel's mobile SoCs, owing to expected power and performance advancements in the upcoming Silvermont SoCs. Additionally, FBR's comprehensive research into microservers now gives it confidence in the Co's defensibility of the server market.
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