U.S. markets topped off a good week on an upbeat note, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average reaching 18,000 for the first time this month. The other major indices were higher as well.
Traders were perhaps a bit cautious about the effects of a rising U.S. dollar on company earnings, and were waiting on the sidelines to see further earnings results.
Crude oil was up well over 1% after Baker Hughes Incorporated (NYSE:BHI) reported that oil drillers had picked up the pace of U.S. rig reductions, after seeing fewer reductions over the last two weeks. All in all, there were 42 fewer oil rigs searching for oil over U.S. lands this week, the steepest drop in a month. Only 760 rigs are still drilling, the lowest number since December 2010.
The Dow and the S&P 500 climbed 0.5%, while the Nasdaq Composite was up 0.4%. Most sectors were higher today and industrial and healthcare stocks were easily the two best.
One stock that had a major impact on the Dow today was General Electric Company (NYSE:GE), which along with Nokia Corporation (ADR) (NYSE:NOK), and Excel Trust Inc (NYSE:EXL) rang the closing bell as three of today’s best stocks.
General Electric Company (GE)
The company that “brings good things to life,” brought great news to investors today, saying it will sell most of its GE Capital banking business, including $26.5 billion in real estate assets, with most of that being purchased by Wells Fargo & Co (NYSE:WFC) and Blackstone Group LP (NYSE:BX).
Wall Street saw this as GE taking an important step away from financials and back to its manufacturing base. Morningstar analyst Barbara Noverini noted: “We needed to see that management was serious about exiting this part of the business — leaving behind the old GE and moving forward.”
The icing on the cake today for GE stock was the company stating it will give back as much as $90 billion to investors through stock buybacks and dividends by 2018. GE stock finished nearly 11% higher on the day.
Nokia Corporation (ADR) (NOK)
NOK stock moved up 4% amid news it was considering selling its map navigation business, called HERE, in order to focus on improving growth in its wireless-network unit and cutting its debt.
A number of potential suitors have already had conversations with the Finnish equipment maker, including Uber Technologies Inc., and a group of German carmakers.
HERE is valued at $2.1 billion, considerably down from 2008, when Nokia bought navigation system software provider Navteq Corporation for $8.1 billion. NOK was criticized by analysts at the time for overpaying, and it would seem that the critics were correct.
Excel Trust Inc (EXL)
EXL stock roared 14% higher after the aforementioned Blackstone Group said it will also buy Excel Trust, the San Diego-based real estate developer and management company REIT, for $1 billion in cash and almost $2 billion when debt and preferred stock is also totaled.
Blackstone will pay $15.85 per share for EXL stock, a 15% premium to the closing price of EXL stock on Thursday. EXL will pay out one final common-stock dividend to shareholders in July.
The acquisition was unanimously approved by the EXL board and is expected to close during the second half of 2015.
As of this writing, Ethan Roberts does not hold a position in any of the aforementioned securities.
