Wednesday, September 29, 2004

Wednesday Close

S&P 500 1,114.80 +.43%
NASDAQ 1,893.94 +1.29%


Leading Sectors
Disk Drives +2.91%
Airlines +2.21%
Semis +1.85%

Lagging Sectors
Energy -1.18%
Oil Service -1.51%
Broadcasting -2.20%

Other
Crude Oil 49.56 -.68%
Natural Gas 6.91 +8.82%
Gold 414.90 +.17%
Base Metals 117.28 +.88%
U.S. Dollar 88.07 -.05%
10-Yr. T-note Yield 4.09% +2.10%
VIX 13.21 -4.48%
Put/Call .84 -6.67%
NYSE Arms .79 -11.24%

After-hours Movers
TLB -8.29% after cutting 3Q forecast.
RECN -4.84% after substantially beating 1Q estimates and saying future hiring may hurt operating income.
NARA +4.15%

Recommendations
Goldman Sachs reiterated Outperform on PFE. Goldman reiterated Underperform on TSG and S.

After-hours News
U.S. stocks rose today, led by technology shares, after oil prices fell and an economic report showed faster economic growth than originally expected. After the close, Saudi Arabia's top religious authority banned the use of camera cellular phones, saying the devices are responsible for helping to spread "obscenity," the AP reported. The Montreal Expos said they're moving to Washington next season, bringing Major League Baseball back to the nation's capital after a 33-year absence, Bloomberg said. The chairman of a U.S. Congress panel responsible for Fannie Mae gained authority to subpoena executives at the biggest U.S. mortgage finance company for information related to allegations of accounting violations, Bloomberg reported. AIG said the U.S. Department of Justice is investigating the company for helping PNC Financial Services remove bad loans from its books, Bloomberg said. A judge struck down portions of the USA Patriot Act requiring Internet and telephone companies to surrender customer records sought in terrorism investigations and barring notice to clients that their data was handed over, Bloomberg reported. Micron Technology reported a second-straight quarterly profit as sales jumped 34%, Bloomberg reported. Delphi said the U.S. SEC is investigating $86.5 million of the company's transactions with computer-services provider Electronic Data Systems, Bloomberg said.

BOTTOM LINE: The Portfolio finished unchanged today as my rising internet and homebuilding longs offset losses in my commodity-related longs. I covered a few technology shorts in the afternoon and added some semiconductor longs, leaving the Portfolio 125% net long. One of my new longs is BRCM and I am using a $26.50 stop-loss on this position. Volume increased and the advance/decline line was pretty strong today. However, measures of investor complacency rose again. The major U.S. indices will likely remain strong through week's end.

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