All Earnings, All the Time — Thursday’s IP Market Recap

by Marc Bastow | July 19, 2012 5:28 pm

[1]Great earnings news across the market offset negative existing-home sales[2] news from the National Association of Realtors, weak manufacturing activity numbers from the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia’s Business Outlook Index and a drop in the Conference Board’s index of Leading Economic Indicators.

The Nasdaq finished up 0.79% at 2,965, while the S&P 500 and Dow both finished ahead 0.27% at 1,376 and 12,943, respectively.

Technology stocks did the heavy lifting Thursday. eBay (NASDAQ:EBAY[3]) soared nearly 9% on the day to a 6-year high following Wednesday’s release of outstanding earnings, with PayPal and eBay Marketplaces posting impressive gains[4] for the quarter. Fellow e-tailer Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN[5]) shared in the good news and saw its shares rally more than 4%.

The glee from Wednesday’s after-the-bell earnings release[6] from IBM (NYSE:IBM[7]) was carried forward to 4% advances on the day. VMware (NYSE:VMW[8]), which has changed CEOs[9] while announcing strong preliminary earnings, rallied for the second straight day, gaining nearly 3%. Citrix (NASDAQ:CTXS[10]), Oracle (NASDAQ:ORCL[11]) and Dell (NASDAQ:DELL[12]) all followed suit, rising up more than 1%.

The technology roll continued after hours, as Google (NASDAQ:GOOG[13]) beat earnings expectations[14] with a profit of $10.12 per share on revenue of $8.42 billion. Google shares edged up 2.2% in after hours trading.

Meanwhile, Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT[15]) swung to its first quarterly loss since going public in 1986, missing analysts’ forecast despite a 4% increase in revenues. MSFT’s loss was primarily attributable to a $6 billion write-down of its ill-fated investment[16] in social media company aQuantive, as underlying earnings were 73 cents per share. And even MSFT couldn’t be held back, moving up around 3% in early after-hours trading.

Walgreen (NYSE:WAG[17]) shares rocketed nearly 12% on an announced agreement[18] with Express Scripts (NASDAQ:ESRX[19]), ending a rocky period between the two companies. The news sent competitors CVS Caremark (NYSE:CVS[20]) and Rite-Aid (NYSE:RAD[21]) down 6% each.

Financial services companies took it on the chin as both American Express (NYSE:AXP[22]) and Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS[23]) released disappointing numbers. AMEX was hurt by slower consumer spending[24], while Morgan’s securities and fixed-income trading business was slower than expected. MS sank 5.3%, while AMEX dropped 3.5%.

Despite already getting hammered earlier this month thanks to SuperValu (NYSE:SVU[25]), grocery store chain Safeway (NYSE:SWY[26]) tumbled more than 4% as revenues increased but earnings decreased[27] for the second quarter, disappointing investors.

General Electric (NYSE:GE[28]), Schlumberger (NYSE:SLB[29]) and Xerox (NYSE:XRX[30]) are among companies reporting earnings tomorrow.

Three Up

• Tempur-Pedic (NYSE:TPX[31]): Up 8% ($2.94) to $27.57.
• Cirrus Logic (NASDAQ:CRUS[32]): Up 7.2% ($1.92) to $28.51.
• Electronic Arts (NASDAQ:EA[33]): Up 6.7% (77 cents) to $12.27.

Three Down

• Isis (NASDAQ:ISIS[34]): Down 7.6% ($1.06) to $12.96.
• Louisiana-Pacific (NYSE:LPX[35]): Down 6.1% (69 cents) to $10.69.
• Monster Beverage (NASDAQ:MNST[36]): Down 5.7% ($4.07) to $67.83.

Marc Bastow is an Assistant Editor at InvestorPlace.com. As of this writing, he was long MSFT.

Source URL: https://investorplace.com/2012/07/thursdays-ip-market-recap-ibm-vmw-ctxs-orcl-del/

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