By Jeff Sandford
Positive earnings sent technology stocks higher for the fourth straight session. Is it a summer rally? If all the good news surrounding the TSE is any indication, it just may be.
As seems to be the usual the last few sessions, the TSE 300 set another record. The 300 finished at 10,845.26, after reaching 10,873.48 in intraday trading, a gain of 65.70 points. The 300 composite continued to home in on 11,000 as it closed above the Dow today for the first time in years.
The action was narrow again as declining issues outnumbered advancing issues, 587 to 465. Trading volume was also extremely light at just over 100 million shares. Evidently the weather in cottage country was too pleasant for most traders to find their way back to the city.
The story was, as usual, Nortel Networks. The Hercules of the 300 tacked on another $1.80 to close at $117.70. Considering Nortel is now weighted at 30% of the TSE 300, that’s pretty well the entire story on stocks today.
Rounding out the crop of usual gainers were 724 Solutions, up $11.60 and JDS Uniphase, up $7.05.
No surprise then that that the industrials sub-index led the way up. Of the five sub-indices that finished higher today, industrials was up the most at 1.44%.
In other Canadian technology news, former mining company turned tech-play, itemus Inc., announced that is relaunching its business model, again. Evidently any news is good news, as itemus stock rose 14% on the announcement.
SKG Interactive, another former mining company now focussed on “creating Canada’s premiere e-commerce destination,” was up today on news that they have launched almost half of the Web sites they have promised to develop for GlobalTV.com. SKG Interactive has until July 28 to meet its original listing requirement as a gold mining company or the TSE is going to commence proceedings, which may result in suspension from trading.
In contrast to the slow day on the TSE, there was heavy volume of 38.6 million shares traded on the CDNX. But with 241 advances and 309 declines, the trading was narrow. The CDNX closed down 3.40 at 3,387.70
The Canadian dollar finished the day at US67.50¢.
The story south of the border was similar too much of last week. NASDAQ took off while the Dow limped along behind.
The NASDAQ composite finished the day at 4,274.68, up 28.50 points, while the Dow finished down 8,048 points at 10,804.27.
Again, it was semiconductor and net stocks making advances. Also, anything with the words “optical networking” attached did well. Corning, a big name in the field put on 8 points to bring it to $267. Surpassing its earnings estimates by 14¢ a share no doubt helped.
Qualcomm was also up on news that several of its patents had been upheld in court battles in Japan and Europe.
It’s a big week for earnings announcements. Reporting this week will be Intel, Microsoft, IBM, EMC, Sun Microsystems, Lucent Technologies and America Online.