Close Dow -27.95 at 9625.44, S&P -3.33 at 1080.17, Nasdaq -30.58 at 1782.10: At times, it appeared as if it would be a bifurcated market as the blue chip averages traded in positive territory for the majority of the session, underpinned by healthy gains in the bank, airline, apparel, and telecom stocks... Ultimately, though, the strength in those areas was not enough to motivate investors to commit to long positions as ongoing misgivings about accounting practices, valuation levels, and continued weakness in the technology sector led to another difficult outing that left all of the major indices in negative territory by the closing bell...
The tech weakness stemmed from Cisco's (CSCO -1.55) admission that it wouldn't provide earnings guidance beyond fiscal Q3 (Apr.) due to a lack of visibility on the part of its customers and continued uncertainty regarding the economic environment... In addition, a late-day breakdown in the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (i.e. SOX) weighed further on the proceedings; the tech-heavy Nasdaq ended at its lows for the day and with its fifth consecutive loss...
4:59PM GlobeSpan Virata tops estimates (GSPN) 12.85 -1.16: Reports Q4 (Dec) loss of $0.01 per share, $0.04 better than the Multex consensus of ($0.05); revenues fell 57.6% year/year to $55.4 mln vs the $52.0 mln consensus.
4:36PM TriQuint Semi tops estimates, updates guidance (TQNT) 9.75 +0.30: --Correction-- Posts a Q4 pro forma profit of$0.01 a share, $0.03 better than consensus. Rev declined 19% sequentially to $65.44 mln (consensus $64.28 mln). For Q1, co sees earnings of breakeven to a slight loss on rev of $60-$65 mln (consensus -$0.02 and $63.56 mln)... Earlier we reported a Q4 loss of $0.01.
3:37PM Sector Watch: Semiconductor : Late session breakdown in the group with the semi equip stocks pacing the way (KLAC -6.5%, NVLS -6.2%, AMAT -4.4%). The latter has broken below its 200 day simple and has tested support at its 50 day simple ma (42.6). Other stocks in the sector on the defensive include: AMD -3.4%, LSCC -3.9%, XLNX -5.7%, TER -4.4% and MU -7.4%.
finance.yahoo.com
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