15:38 2007/04/24
Equity markets held back by another weak housing data point
- Advances trail decliners by nearly a 2:1 margin on both the NYSE and NASDAQ, but Indices are holding up fairly well with the help of various corporate earnings and announcements. The Dow is getting a boost from IBM after authorizing a $15B buyback program and raising its dividend by 33%. Dupont is adding close to 2% after earnings. WMT ??“1.5% weighs on the Index along with weakness in other retailers after Target ??“2.5% said April SSS look below forecasts. PBM names are seeing a nice pop after earnings. ESRX +8.3% MHS +5.8% CVS +2.5% A solid outlook from Texas Instruments has helped the semis buck today??™s trend. TXN +8% SMH +2.7% Equity futures did push to session lows after March existing homes sales showed the largest drop since early 1989, and the Richmond Fed Manufacturing Index was reported below expectations. Homebuilding names ticked lower on the data but losses have been moderate. - The soft U.S. data sent Treasury futures higher and the Dollar lower. The 10-year yield has fallen to 4.616% while the 30-year has slipped to 4.80%. Fed funds have ticked slightly higher with the Oct contract forecasting nearly a 60% likelihood of a rate cut by early fall. EUR/USD and Cable moved to session highs following the data but have since drifted off their best levels. The US Dollar Index is down 0.3% at 81.50, but the Greenback is holding ground against the Loonie after the Bank of Canada left rates unchanged. June crude futures have slipped back into negative territory to $65.53 testing session lows down $0.41. May copper is down 1.2% to $3.58 while June gold is down less than 0.5% at $691.70
|
Printer-Friendly Version
Send This Page
Add to Favorites
Comments
News RSS Feeds
