This is your Benzinga news summary for Thursday, December 2, 2011, covering headlines from Thursday's daytime trading session.
Today at market close, the Dow Jones Index traded up about 61.84 points or 0.51%, the S&P 500 traded 0.83% higher, the Nasdaq Composite Index traded up 0.83%, and the U.S. dollar trades slightly lower near the $80.30 level.
Earlier today, Craig-Hallum upgraded Akamai
AKAM to Buy and Wedbush upgraded Micron Technologies
MU to Outperform. View all of
today's upgrades here.
Stifel Nicolaus downgraded KB Home
KBH to Hold and Leerink Swann downgraded Vivus
VVUS to Market Perform. View all of
today's downgrades here.
Overseas, European markets ended their trading session higher. Britain's FTSE 100 gained 1.25%, Germany's DAX increased by 1.05% and France's CAC 40 rallied by 1.36% on the session. Asian stocks ended their session lower. China's Shanghai Index slid by 0.21%, Japan's Nikkei 225 decreased by 0.77%, and the Hang Seng index lost 0.21%.
On the economic calendar, US GDP QoQ came in at 1.8% versus an estimate of 2%; Initial Jobless Claims came in at 364K versus an estimate of 380K, Michigan Confidence came in at 69.9 versus an estimate of 68, Leading Indicators came in at 0.5% versus an estimate of 0.3%.
On the commodity front,
gold and
silver futures traded mixed today, with gold trading about 0.3% lower today. Energy futures are higher, with
crude oil up over 0.7% near the $99.40 level and
gasoline futures are trading higher by about 0.7%.
Natural Gas futures are higher by about 0.4% and
copper futures are trading over 0.1% higher.
Today's earnings announcements include CalAmp Corp Reports Q3 EPS $0.09 vs $0.03 Est; Revenues $32.8M vs $32.25M Est.
In corporate news, Praxair Distribution
PX announced that
it will acquire Texas Welders Supply Company for an undisclosed amount.
Eastman Kodak
EK announced that
it will sell its Eastman Gelatine Subsidiary. Terms were undisclosed.
NewLead Holdings
NEWL announced that
it will be selling more tankers in order to reduce debt.
Today's Movers include:
SandRidge Energy SD +23.1% after announcing $1B contract with Mississippee
Akamai Technologies AKAM +18.6% after announcing it will acquire Contendo
Micron Technologies MU +15.7% on positive earnings and guidance
American Greetings AM -21.1% on poor earnings
Vivus VVUS -16.6% on negative notes from Roth Capital
Herman Miller MLHR -14.8% on poor Q2 earnings
This concludes your news summary for December 22, 2011.
© 2024 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.
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