Tuesday, February 03, 2004

Tuesday Close

S&P 500+.07%
NASDAQ+.05%


Leading/Lagging Sectors
Homebuilders+1.58%
Drugs+.7%
Gaming+.68%
Airlines-2.93%
Disk Drives-2.78%
HMO's-1.99%

After-Hours Movers
ERES+5.0% Earnings exceeded estimates...raised guidance.
IVIL+15% Earnings exceeded estimates...raised guidance.
WEBX+7.3% Earnings exceeded estimates..raised guidance.
CIEN-13.6% lowers earnings guidance.
TRDO-9.3% Earnings didn't meet expectations...lowered guidance.
CSCO-4.2% Earnings exceeded expectations but didn't meet whisper numbers...guidance was conservative.

After-Hours News
Major Indices were little changed Tues. The bears had plenty of reasons to push stocks lower, yet stocks held firm. After the close, US banks reported an increase in demand for business loans for the first time in 4 years. The most important reasons for the increase were greater customer investment in plant and equipment and increased customer needs to finance accounts and inventories.

Bottom Line: Tech will likely come under pressure tomorrow on continued profit-taking. Cisco's quarter was good, but likely not good enough to justify its current valuation. CIEN will also result in a re-evaluation of the notion that all networking companies are benefiting from the current environment. As I stated earlier in the day, I want to see the market's reaction to the CSCO quarter before initiating new positions. As of right now it looks to be negative. I did not trade today and the portfolio finished down a bit. I am still market neutral and looking to trade tomorrow.





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