12:30 ET Dow +17, Nasdaq +29, S&P +3.77: [BRIEFING.COM] Indices remain in positive ground, but buyers not showing a great deal of conviction... Volume is on the light-to-moderate side with 869 mln shares having traded at the Nasdaq and 545 mln shares having traded at the NYSE... The A/D line has improved from recent sessions, though, as the participation in today's modest gains has been fairly broad-based... Chip and chip equipment shares are playing an active role in the Nasdaq's advance which has been an encouraging reference point for traders who have come to recognize that as the chip stocks go, more often than not, so goes the Nasdaq... Investors should catch a glimpse of where the chip and chip equipment sectors may be headed after the close when Novellus Systems (NVLS +0.47) presents its mid-quarter update... SOX +1.7%... NYSE Adv/Dec 1764/1125... Nasdaq Adv/Dec 2080/1363.
12:00 ET Dow +29, Nasdaq +34, S&P +5.59: [BRIEFING.COM] The market is looking better than it has in recent sessions, but it hasn't moved with the same swagger it did just a few weeks ago... That's because investors are somewhat leery of the market's ability to sustain its rally effort with the earnings warning season hanging over its head like a dark cloud... Today, though, the market has traded with a positive bias as the absence of any major warnings, like the one heard from Sun Microsystems (SUNW +0.17), has enticed market participants to do some bargain hunting... As to be expected, most of those efforts have been concentrated in the tech sector which has endured some noticeable selling pressure in the past three sessions... Leading its advance have been the semiconductor, software, telecom equipment and biotech issues... Feeding the renewed buying interest, too, has been the tech sector's resilience in the face of more EPS reductions from Wall Street brokerages... Compaq (CPQ +0.22), Oracle (ORCL +0.76), Sanmina (SANM +1.27), Xilinx (XLNX +0.27) and Altera (ALTR +0.83) are some of the better-known stocks that have encountered EPS reductions this morning... Aside from the tech sector's resilience, the market has also drawn support from an expectation that the Fed will continue its easing ways at its June FOMC meeting... Among the factors contributing to that belief were an 8K increase in initial claims for the week of May 26, a 38.7% read on the Chicago PMI report (below 50% is indicative of a manufacturing recession), and comments from Dallas Fed President McTeer who thinks Q2 growth should be around zero and that unemployment should rise due to current levels being unsustainable... The favorable rate outlook has been a boon for the cyclical issues today which are leading the blue chip advance at this time... SOX +2.2%... Nasdaq 100 +2.0%... S&P Midcap 400 +1.2%... Russell 2000 +1.0%... NYSE Adv/Dec 1764/1076... Nasdaq Adv/Dec 2054/1310. |
