Oil future---Ellen (slow)
World and national news --- Mark (slow)
>> gas oil futures fell today in london after hurricane dennis missed oil rigs and coastal refiners in the gulf of mexico. it reached land in western florida yesterday with winds of up to 120 miles per hour, missing louisiana where 16% of u.s. refining capacity is located. gas oil futures fell 5% making for the biggest fluctuation of any commodity around the world today. let’s get perspective on this by bringing in the bloomberg terminal. what we are looking at is a year to date graph of gas oil futures trading on the international petroleum exchange. gas oil prices rose more than% between june 29 and july 6. analysts say dennis has not affected production and refining as badly as the markets anticipated. that caused the commodity to drop to its lowest level in just about two weeks. however, gas oil still up 41%. brent crude futures in london also fell. oil dropping 2.3% to its lowest level since june 30. that cleanup is underway in florida, alabama and mississippi which did take a beating sunday from the hurricane. mark crumpton is here with more in our world and national news update. mark?
>> ellen, although dennis came ashore sunday with less power than forecasters had predicted, it did uproot trees, rip off roofs and siding and knock out power to thousands. dennis made landfall between florida’s pensacola beach and nafar beach with winds up to 120 miles per hour. the national weather service says dennis weakened to a tropical depression over northeast mississippi. president bush has declared florida, alabama and mississippi a disaster area.
点击播报
Listen Market briefing --- Ellen (slow)
Earnings --- Deirdre (slow)
NYSE --- Deb (fast)
Nasdaq --- Robert (slow)
second-quarter earnings will exceed forecasts. oil prices declined for the third day. a drop of 1.2% for crude. the drop came as hurricane dennis missed rigs and platforms concentrated off the texas and louisiana coast. we’ll have su keenan look at the oil in the aftermath of the hurricane. the settling numbers in the stock market today -- second-quarter profit report for genentech stronger than anticipated, 30 cents a share excluding items. analysts were expecting 26 cents, so beating by four cents a share. sales topping expectations, coming in at $1.53 billion compared to analysts’ estimates of $1.39. the company saying it sees 2005 earnings per share, exkhgating items, rising more than 35%, excluding items. the company saying second-quarter avastin sales up 85% and tarceva sales up, as well. we’ll get reaction from jason kantor of r.b.c. capital markets who raised his price target for those shares. alaska airline pilots voting to reject a proposed contract. the airline pilots’ association at the airline said 90% of those pilots who voted passed ballots against the tentative agreement. the union said 95% of its union members did vote. turning attention back to the stock market and gains we saw today, deirdre bolton was following action all day long and joins us. a lot of focus on the earnings. tell us what happened.
>> we did see the combination of lower oil prices and companies exceeding earnings estimates, feeding investor optimism. the s&p 500 closed at its highest level since march. stocks rose, along with investor expectations for second quarter earnings growth.
>> for this earnings season, my expectations are to do better for the 13th consecutive quarter than analysts’ expectations. analysts’ expectations are in the 8% to 10% area.
>> fueling optimism, mylan laboratories, shares gained 3% after the company’s fiscal first-quarter profit surpassed analysts’ estimates. competitors, watson pharmaceutical, barr pharmaceutical traded up and i’veec at a 52-week high. evidence that business may pick up for semiconductors sent that group higher. intel, texas instruments and applied materials rose. spot prices of the most widely used type of computer memory chip jumped to the highest weekly level in over a year.
>> i think tech spending will be better than what the market expects. i think you’ll see further catch-up with the general market .
>> on the s&p 500, household products maker procter & gamble led gains. prudential upgraded the stock, saying the company will be able to buy back shares aggressively after a shareholder vote tomorrow on its proposed purchase of gillette. among stocks that fell, dreamworks animation, its shares tumbled more than 13.5%. the studio run by jeffrey katzenberg cut its profit forecast and scrapped a stock sale after weak demand for “shrek 2” home videos. the stock is down nearly 40 percent this year.
>> thanks so much. we’ll continue the look at the gains in stocks. deborah kostroun filed details from the big board.
>> the s&p 500, now at its highest level since march 7, also the highest point of the year. that’s how we closed out. stocks rising for a third straight day and in those three kays, the dow has packed on 233 points. since the lows on april 20, we’ve seen pretty big gains in the dow and s&p 500. the dow up 5.1% and s&p 500 up 7.2%. this is the springtime low, also coming in at a time when the market has been tested. terrorist attacks last week out of london, higher interest rates, higher oil and slower earnings so the market has really come out ok since those lows. talking about those levels, looking at record highs we saw on friday. we saw record highs again today. in the russell 2000, small caps and midcaps, so any gains from here, once again, record highs. the stocks rising for the past three days and crude oil falling three days in a row. oil services lower, also integrated oil stocks lower. you now have crude oil at $58.92 a barrel and we saw crude oil coming down today after hurricane dennis missed the oil rigs and platforms off the gulf of mexico. looking at mylan laboratories, it climbed after the drugmaker’s profit last quarter they said, now, will surpass analysts’ estimates. this company is also fighting a $5.4 billion takeover bid by investor carl icahn. wellpoint, largest u.s. health insurance provider, agreed to pay as much as $308 million to settle a lawsuit that claims more than 700,000 doctors were underpaid for treating patients. the company will set up a $135 million fund for doctors and give $5 million to awe foundation for improving healthcare according to doctors’ attorneys and the company saying in separate statements. i’m deborah kostroun at the new york stock exchange for bloomberg news.
>> sticking with our look at the stock market today, the nasdaq climbed to its highest close in six months. transportation and chip stocks helped lead the gains. we have details from robert gray.
>> the nasdaq composite gaining more than 1% in today’s session, completing the best three days of gains since october 28, 2004, closing at the highest level since january 3, the forst trading day of the year. the transport and semiconductor stocks leading the way. biotech higher. all the industry groups higher across the board in today’s session. as crude oil fell, transports in particular with out-sized gains in yellow, c.h. robinson, ryanair and northwest airlines moving higher today. semiconductors rising. computer chipmakers gaining. semiconductor equipment makers higher, as well. the s.o.x. at its highest intraday level since december 7, the last time above 450, closing at its highest level since july 9 last year at that 459 level where it closed today, as well, after a 2% gain in today’s trading. saw novellus shares rising, they’re speaking to analysts at semi con west. micro semi corporation at a record high today and maxim enterprises rising after goldman sachs raising it to outperform from in line. ebay saying their online payment service, paypal china, for chinese internet users, launches september 1. with the chinese-related theme, u.t. starcom rising, wireless cable system provider in china, awarded an infrastructure contract from china telecom.
