With three of the tech sector’s biggest names posting better than expected quarterly results, you’d think the stock market would have finally gotten a bit of a break from volatility on Friday, but no such luck.
Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), AMD (NYSE: AMD) and IBM (NYSE: IBM) all posted better than expected results late Thursday, but all three finished well off their highs by the end of the day Friday, as investors remained preoccupied with the health of the credit and housing markets.
Stocks started the day lower on the latest weak housing numbers, rallied strongly into the afternoon on news that billionaire investor Warren Buffett is buying stocks and on signs of modest improvement in credit markets, then sold off in the final two hours of trading to end the day lower.
Still, after the past week’s 2,000-point trading range in the Dow, Friday’s 563-point range felt somewhat tame by comparison.
Google ended the day 5.5% higher and AMD 2.2% higher, while IBM slipped 0.8%.
PMC-Sierra (NASDAQ: PMCS) fell 14% on a disappointing outlook.
Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL), which will report its results on Tuesday, fell 4.4%. Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT), Texas Instrument (NYSE: TXN), VMware (NYSE: VMW), Yahoo (NASDAQ: YHOO), EMC (NYSE: EMC), AT&T (NYSE: T), Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) and Baidu (NASDAQ: BIDU) are among a long list of names reporting quarterly results next week.
Juniper (NASDAQ: JNPR) gained 7% on a UBS upgrade ahead of its quarterly report next week.
The Nasdaq slipped 6 to 1711, the S&P lost 5 to 940, and the Dow fell 127 to 8852. Volume declined to 6.61 billion shares on the NYSE, and 2.78 billion on the Nasdaq. Advancers led by a 19-15 margin on the NYSE, while decliners led 16-12 on the Nasdaq. Downside volume was 52% on the NYSE, and 53% on the Nasdaq. New highs-new lows were 47-211 on the NYSE, and 2-133 on the Nasdaq.