Blue Chips Outperform

Blue chips stocks led the market higher on Monday on hopes of a neutral Federal Reserve, but Internet and technology stocks again lagged. A ruling after the bell that could hand the presidential election to George W. Bush sparked an after-hours rally.

The ISDEX fell 8 to 406, and the Nasdaq lost 29 to 2615. The S&P 500 gained 10 to 1324, and the Dow soared 187 to 10,560 on strength in cyclicals. Volume declined to 1.08 billion shares on the NYSE and 1.84 billion on the Nasdaq. Decliners led by a few issues on the NYSE and by 25 to 14 on the Nasdaq. For earnings reports, visit our earnings calendar and reported earnings. For after hours quotes and news, visit our after hours trading site.

Cisco fell 2 3/16 to 46 5/16 at the start of a two-day analyst meeting. Merrill Lynch made positive comment on the stock.

Optical networking stocks rose on positive comments from ABN Amro. JDS Uniphase rose 2 1/2 to 58 11/16, Ciena , which reports earnings Thursday, climbed 3 1/16 to 80, and Corning added 5/16 to 61 1/4.

eBay fell 2 7/16 to 32 5/16 on concern that the company may buy CMGI unit uBid or other companies.

Ariba slipped 15/16 to 60 despite Sprint PCS' launch of its Ariba-powered B2B platform. Positive comments from CS FirstBoston also didn't help B2B stocks, as Commerce One lost 1 1/8 to 27 3/4, and i2 fell 11 5/16 to 88 1/16.

Robertson Stephens cut 2001 estimates for Ameritrade , off 5/16 to 8 1/2, and E*Trade , up 1/2 to 8 13/16.

Intraware plummeted 1 23/32 to 1 3/32 after announcing that it will lay off 47% of its workforce, or 180 employees.

Some technical comments on the market: Note: We are now including charts in the technical market commentary. If you can't get the charts via the e-mail newsletter version, try this link: http://www.afterhourstrading.com/column.html

The Nasdaq and ISDEX retested their recent lows on lower volume today, and so far haven't made lower lows (2523 and 382 were the recent lows), all of which are positives for Net and tech stocks. Now can they rally from here? If the Nasdaq can take out 2755 and the ISDEX 434, we would break the cycle of lower lows and lower highs. To the downside, a break of 2523 would likely lead to much lower lows, potentially to around 2200 on the Nasdaq and 2100 on the Nasdaq 100 (see chart below). The 1990 logarithmic trendline is around 2300-2400 on the Nasdaq, a major support.

The ISDEX has so far held strong support in the 375-400 range. If it can take out its broken support line at about 450, a bottom of some sorts may be in.

The S&P 500 got back above its broken support line at about 1315, and has so far held support around 1300. 1330-1340 could provide upside resistance, as could the broken 1994 log trendline at about 1388.

The Dow is just below its downtrend line at about 10,585; north of that line, and the old economy stocks could drag the whole market higher. The index could still be forming a 400-600 point descending triangle, with potential downside to 9750-10,000. A close below 10,369 would be bearish.

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