Day Traders Diary

10/25/10

U.S. stocks extended Monday's gains thanks to better than expected existing-home sales numbers and a drop in the US dollar. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 102 points to 11,235. The S&P 500 Index climbed 11 points to 1,194. The Nasdaq Composite added 23 points to 2,502. The commodities are on fire thanks to the weak dollar. Fertilizers are jumping. Freeport McMoran is up 3%. The industrials are all performing well. Honeywell is up 2% on an upgrade. GE is up a percent after receiving an order from India for $750 million. The techs are performing well. IBM is rebounding heading back toward its 52 week high. Google and Apple are both up over a percent. F5 Networks is up 2% on an upgrade. Microsoft is one of the few techs trading lower on a downgrade. Even the financials are higher. Citigroup is higher thanks to an upgrade. Hartford is up 3% on an upgrade. One local merger to report this morning, Community Bancorp is buying Wilbur Corp for $101 million. Wilbur is jumping 50%. Bank of America can't get out of its own way. The stock opened higher, but then sold off. In the retail space Office Depot is jumping 12% after the CEO resigned. Radio Shack is down 7% after reporting lackluster earnings. After the first hour the Dow pulled back up only 80 points. A number of financials are now in the red. The Nasdaq remains near the highs of the day. Through the morning and into the afternoon the averages remain in the green, but off the highs. The weakness remains in the financial sector. Bank of America is down nearly 2%. In the last hour more selling pressure caused the averages to give up most of their gains. The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished up 31 points at 11,164. The S&P 500 advanced 2 points to 1,185, led by gains in chemical-company stocks. The Nasdaq Composite rose 11 points to 2,490.

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