This time it’s a company manning the headlines and moving the markets, as Apple (AAPL) stock fell more than 5% after its high-profile iPhone announcement on Tuesday failed to excite investors or brokerage houses.
AAPL shares were downgraded Wednesday by JPMorgan, Credit Suisse, Bank of America and UBS, and the stock fell right from the opening bell. That helped weigh down the Nasdaq, which fell 0.11% to finish at 3725.01.
Balancing out some of the Apple pain was continued stability in Syria, where possible U.S. intervention is on hold pending talks between Russia and Syria and a delay in a Congressional vote on military action.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose for seventh straight day, climbing 0.89% to 15,326.60, and the S&P 500 also managed to counter Apple’s weight, rising 0.31% to end at 1689.13.
Nokia (NOK) jumped nearly 5% after it was upgraded by both RBC Capital and Bank of America. Meanwhile, Netflix (NFLX) — which touched all-time intraday highs earlier Wednesday, fell nearly 2% after being downgraded by BTIG. Nonetheless, NFLX still is sitting on more than 200% gains year-to-date.
Facebook (FB) rose over 3%, topping the $45 per share mark for the first time since its May 1, 2012 IPO date.
IBM (IBM) rose more than 2% after announcing it would sell its customer-care outsourcing business to hardware reseller Synnex (SNX), whose stock rocketed 21% higher on the news.
Nike (NKE) edged up more than 1% to touch an all-time high as it sees continued buying after it was announced that it, Visa (V) and Goldman Sachs (GS) will join the Dow beginning Sept. 23.
Finally, Verizon (VZ) finalized its record-breaking $49 billion bond sale, the proceeds of which will help finance the purchase of its 45% stake in Verizon Wireless from Vodafone (VOD). VZ finished up fractionally.
Three Up
- Harvest Natural Resources (HNR): Up 26.5% ($1.10) to $5.25.
- Linn Energy (LINE): Up 12.8% ($3.16) to $27.90.
- Fusion-io (FIO): Up 11.5% ($1.51) to $14.64.
Three Down
- Restoration Hardware (RH): Up 11.9% ($9.02) to $67.04
- Multimedia Games (MGAM): Down 7.3% ($2.84) to $36.14
- Cirrus Logic (CRUS): Down 5.2% ($1.20) to $21.89
Marc Bastow is an Assistant Editor at InvestorPlace.com. As of this writing, he was long AAPL and MSFT.
