Yahoo fell sharply after hours Wednesday on comments from CEO Tim Koogle that Internet advertising spending is declining. Internet and technology shares headed sharply lower during the day, but the Dow managed a gain on rumors of a JP Morgan buyout.
The ISDEX lost 26 to 809, while the Nasdaq dropped 129 to 4013. The S&P 500 fell 14 to 1492, but the Dow rose 50 to 11,310. Volume rose to 1 billion shares on the NYSE and 1.73 billion on the Nasdaq. Advancers led 15 to 12 on the NYSE, but decliners led 23 to 17 on the Nasdaq. For earnings reports, visit our earnings calendar and reported earnings. For after hours quotes and news, visit our new after hours trading site.
Yahoo lost 5 1/16 to 112 1/16 in regular trading and fell another 8 points to 104 after hours after Koogle told the Robertson Stephens Internet Conference in San Francisco that advertising is weak and he sees a decline in ad spending in the near term. The stock bottomed at 99 1/2 in July.
MP3.com lost 11/16 to 7 7/8 before being halted on a judge’s ruling that the company’s copyright infringement was willful. The stock was reopened after hours and fell below 6. The company was ordered to pay $25,000 for each CD infringed. Liquid Audio
, up 1 17/32 to 8 11/32, and EMusic
, up 3/8 to 2 7/16, rose on the news.
Amazon.com slipped 3/16 to 45 1/2 after trading as high as 49 5/8 on comments from JP Morgan that the stock is beginning its holiday season run-up and could gain another 30% by the end of the year. The stock also has a large short interest fueling its rise. Other etailers followed Amazon higher. Ashford.com
gained 5/16 to 3 1/2, Buy.com
added 23/32 to 4, and eToys
climbed 1 5/16 to 6 3/16. Technical note: Amazon.com appears to have broke out of an inverse head and shoulders bottom at about 44 yesterday. We noted last week that the stock had broken out of a falling wedge, a bullish sign, with upside to $60.
Proxicom slipped 11/16 to 18 15/16 despite a multi-million dollar deal with Toyota to build an online marketplace. The firm also said it is experiencing strong demand.
CS First Boston sent shares of Ameritrade and E*Trade
after upgrading the stocks to Buy from Hold. Ameritrade gained 2 1/4 to 20 7/8 and E*Trade rose 5/16 to 18 3/8.
AOL Latin America rose 5/8 to 8 1/2 after reporting a fourth-quarter loss of 18 cents a share. Revenues rose 55% sequentially to $4 million. No estimates were available.
B2B stocks gave back more of their gains after reversing yesterday. i2 lost 14 3/8 to 160 51/64 after trading as high as 188 yesterday, Commerce One
fell 6 7/8 to 62 3/8 after once again failing at 70 resistance, and Ariba
dropped 10 1/16 to 156 3/8. The sector was rattled yesterday by a report predicting a shakeout in the B2B marketplace sector.
MyWebInc.com soared 2 11/16 to 4 3/8 on news that the company is entering the Chinese residential broadband market.
Some technical comments on the market: The Nasdaq and the ISDEX broke rising wedges to the downside today, following a similar break in the Nasdaq 100 yesterday. The breaks give those indexes potential downside to last month’s lows, but we are hopeful that the sell-off can end at the downtrend lines broken two weeks ago. That downtrend line is now at about 3900 on the Nasdaq and 3800 on the Nasdaq 100. If the indexes can turn up there, i
t would be a positive sign. A break below those levels would likely lead to a wider sell-off. First support on the ISDEX is 790-800, but critical support is about 700, which is now the intersection of the index’s March downtrend and May uptrend lines. The Nasdaq could find some support here, as it is just above its 200- and 50-day moving averages (about 4000 and 3980, respectively).
The S&P 500 also broke a rising wedge to the downside yesterday and retraced to that boundary today (1513) before reversing and falling below the important 1500 level. Next support is in the 1480-1490 range. The index has met with strong resistance around its all-time closing high of 1527. The Dow finally cleared its April secondary high of 11,287, and is now facing 11,400 resistance. However, the index has repeatedly struggled around the 11,300 area, and hasn’t closed near the day’s highs in 8 trading days. 11,100 is the first important support, but the more important support is 10,900, the upper boundary of the Dow’s bearish diamond pattern, which the index broke out of last month.
