Investors continued to experience a bad case of indigestion over rate hike
jitters while Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson threw Microsoft a curveball that sent tech stocks heading lower. Blue chips
showed the worst selling, as the NYSE plunged 211.43 to 10,323.92, the
Nasdaq shed 65.25 to 3,205.36, and the ISDEX fell in sympathy, down 3.58%.
What’s bad for Bill is good for Linux, so most open source related issues
climbed on news of a Microsoft breakup, as shares of VA Linux added 1-7/8 to 43-3/8. Red Hat
tacked on 1 to 16-3/4, while Andover.Net inched
ahead 5/8 to 14-15/16. Meanwhile, Microsoft was hitting a 52-week low,
tumbling 4-1/16 to 61-1/2, as the software giant dragged tech stocks
underwater.
Following yesterday’s House approval of a China trade bill that would
return normal trade relations to Big Red, shares of Asia-related Net
concerns screamed lower. Shares of SINA.com
plunged 7-7/8 to 37-11/16, nearly 20 percent, while chinadotcom
eased 2-1/2 to 24-1/2.
Pointing toward the China trade bill, brokerage house Merrill Lynch had
some bearish comments for CDMA pioneer Qualcomm ,
questioning the likelihood of the technology being adopted in China
following passage of the bill. Shares of the chipset maker fell 7-3/4 to 69.
Priceline.com pulled back 1/4 to 36-1/4, after
the name-your-own-price Web site announced that it had inked a 3 year
marketing pact with American Express in which both
companies will jointly offer business-to-business services to the small
business community on a new B2B portal from Priceline during this quarter.
Shares of Neoforma.com sank 1-7/16 to 9-1/2,
after the healthcare supplies middleman officially announced it would drop
merger plans with Eclipsys and its
HEALTHvision affiliate. Off weeks of market volatility, Neoforma’s
dramatic stock slide left the deal far short of its original $1.7 billion
price tag.
Rumors were swirling that investment broker Goldman Sachs might miss Wall Street quarterly forecasts, which weakened
e-financials. Goldman Sachs crumbled 7 to 73, while discount giant
Charles Schwab back-peddled 1/2 to 38. Although,
shares of E*Trade leapt 1-3/16 to 15-1/8 on news
of a shakeup at the top. Jerry Gramaglia received the nod as new CEO of the
online broker.
No Holiday Relief
