Banks Push Dow, S&P 500 to New Highs: Thursday’s IP Market Recap

by Marc Bastow | July 18, 2013 4:56 pm

[1]Strong earnings from the financial sector, a sharp drop in first-time unemployment claims[2] and another day of Ben Bernanke testimony helped markets build on Wednesday’s momentum.

At Thursday’s end, the Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 0.5% to close at a record 15548.54, while the S&P 500 also set a new high-water mark, up 0.5% to 1689.37. The Nasdaq finished ahead fractionally, closing at 3611.28.

Bank stocks ruled the day as Morgan Stanley (MS[3]) capped a great second-quarter earnings season for the “Big Six” banks[4]. MS announced a 42% rise in earnings[5] and said the Federal Reserve would allow it to buy back $500 million in stock, prompting investors to send it more than 4% higher. Meanwhile, Bank of America (BAC[6]) rose over 3% to finish at two-year highs, while Wells Fargo (WFC[7]) and JPMorgan (JPM[8]) each finished ahead by roughly 2%.

UnitedHealth Group (UNH[9]) stock rose more than 6% after announcing earnings that came in above estimates and raising its guidance for the remainder of the year.

Overstock.com (OSTK[10]) saw its shares rocket ahead over 22%, breaking through to a record close after reporting earnings that beat both the year-ago period’s profits and Wall Street estimates.

In the tech space, IBM (IBM[11]) headed up by about 2% after Wednesday night’s earnings release showing top- and bottom-line improvement, while Intel (INTC[12]) disappointed and slumped off 4%. Meanwhile, Dell (DELL[13]) inched ahead more than 1% after the company postponed its vote[14] on competing takeover plans.

Finally, shares of wireless manufacturer Nokia (NOK[15]) were spared a bit after announcing a revenue miss[16], falling fractionally.

After-hours news was dominated by Google (GOOG[17]) and Microsoft (MSFT[18]).

Google’s earnings for Q2 slipped from $10.13 per share to $9.71 on revenues that grew to $14.1 billion, both figures falling short. Meanwhile, Microsoft earnings fell a penny per share year-over-year to 66 cents on revenues that improved 10% to $19.9 billion; again, both figures missed analyst expectations. Both stocks were off by roughly 5% in early after-hours trading.

Earnings notables for Friday include General Electric (GE[19]) and Vodafone (VOD[20]).

Three Up

• Supervalu (SVU[21]): Up 16.8% ($1.14) to $7.91.
• Johnson Controls (JCI[22]): Up 8.3% ($3.09) to $40.43.
• Apollo Global Management (APO[23]): Up 5.8% ($1.41) $26.24.

Three Down

• Select Comfort (SCSS[24]): Down 9.5% ($2.53) to $24.03.
• Sherwin-Williams (SHW[25]): Down 8.3% ($15.25) to $167.94.
• Ebay (EBAY[26]): Down 6.7% ($3.86) to $53.52.

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

Source URL: https://investorplace.com/2013/07/banks-push-dow-sp-500-to-new-highs-thursdays-ip-market-recap/

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