Florida’s Carnival Corporation (NYSE:CCL) is floating up 3.5% today, as crude oil prices fell 4% and UBS raised its target price to $44. The cheaper oil is, the cheaper it is to power Carnival’s massive boats around the world, increasing its profit margin.
Carnival is the best-performing stock on the InvestorPlace.com Real America Index today. Other top performers include:
Texas’ Southwest Airlines (NYSE: LUV) is also enjoying the benefits of lower oil prices, soaring 2.27%. Part of the reason for the oil drop is President Obama seeking to improve his sagging popularity by tapping the strategic oil reserves, adding more supply to the market.
California’s Apple, Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) is up 1.51% . There’s no specific news, but this is likely due to Apple being oversold following a two month downtrend.
Several stocks are taking it on the chin in the Real America Index today:
Louisiana’s Shaw Group (NYSE:SHAW) is down -2.18%, as the company prepares to issue earnings next week. Stocks like Shaw often see increasing volatility on days the market does, as investors are shaken out of weak positions.
Massachusetts’s Boston Properties (NYSE:BXP) is off 3.0%, although there is no immediate news pushing the stock. It has been in tight trading range over the past month, and investors may be getting nervous at the possibility of a weakening economy — bad news for office REITs.
Montana’s Stillwater Mining (NYSE:SWC) has its fortunes tied to the movement of platinum and palladium prices, which have been volatile the past few days. The company is down 5.7% today on a huge 2.7% drop in prices of aforementioned metals.
Looking at the broad perspective, the Real America Index is down a fraction of a percent, against an almost 1% drop in the Dow and S&P 500, and a flat Nasdaq.
About the Real America Index
When Americans wonder how healthy the nation’s economy is, where can they turn? At InvestorPlace, we hope we have the answer: a list of 50 publicly traded stocks we call the Real America Index. Check out the interactive Real America Index map, browse a list of all 50 component stocks, or find out how we created this index.
