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S&P and Dow close at record levels at year end

Nasdaq the big winner in 2020

The S&P and Dow are closing at record levels at the year end.
  • The Nasdaq led the charge in 2020 with a gain of 43.64% That was the largest gain since 2009
  • S&P was up 16.26%.  Since 2010 the S&P is up 240%
  • 57% of the gain in the S&P was from Microsoft, Amazon and Apple
  • The Dow is closing up 7.25% after spending most of the year in the negative. It wasn’t until the gap break higher on November 9th, that the index moved above and stayed above the closing level from 2019 at 28538.44. The Dow was down over -36% at the March low
The final numbers today are showing:
  • S&P index rose 24.03 points or +0.64% to 3756.07
  • NASDAQ index rose 18.279 points or 0.14% at 12888.28
  • Dow industrial average rose 196.92 points or 0.65% to 30606.48
Some of the big gainers for the year include:
  • Nio, +1112.94%
  • Tesla, +743.03%
  • Zoom, +395.71%
  • Crowdstrike, +324.74%
  • Square, +247.89%
  • Chewy, +209.97
  • Nvidia, +121.93%
  • Paypal, +116.51%
  • Albemarle, +101.97%
  • AMD, +99.98%
  • US steel, +88.93%
  • Slack, +88.03%
  • Apple, +80.75%
  • First Solar, +76.77%
  • Amazon, +76.26%
Some big losers for the year include:
  • United Airlines, -50.9%
  • Raytheon, -46.77%
  • Exxon Mobil, -46.03%
  • Schlumberger, -45.7%
  • American Airlines, -45.01%
  • Wells Fargo, -43.9%
  • Boeing, -34.29%
  • Walgreens, -32.36%
  • Delta Air Lines, -31.24%
  • Chevron, -29.92%
  • AT&T, -26.41%
  • Raytheon technologies, -24.12%
  • Citigroup, -22.82%
  • under armor, -22.42%
  • Boston Scientific -20.50%
  • Intel, -16.76%
  • General Dynamics, -15.61%
  • Southwest air, -13.65%
For the Dow 30, the biggest winners included:
  • Apple, +80.75%
  • Microsoft, +41.04%
  • Nike, +39.64%
  • Salesforce, +36.82%
  • Walt Disney, +25.27%
  • Home Depot, +21.63%
  • Walmart, +21.3%
  • Honeywell, +20.17%
The biggest losers from the Dow 30 include:
  • Boeing, -34.29%
  • Walgreens, -32.36%
  • Chevron, -29.92%
  • Intel, -16.76%
  • Bank of America, -13.94%
  • Merck, -10.06%
  • J.P. Morgan, -8.85%
  • Cisco, -6.69%

NASDAQ closes at a new record.

 Major indices close higher

The NASDAQ index close at a another record high. The previous high close came in at 11,210.84. The index close today at 11,264.95. The S&P index traded above its all-time high closing price but could not sustain the gains into the close.
The final numbers are showing:
  • S&P index up 10.69 points or 0.32% at 3385.54. The high price reached 3390.80. The low price extended to 3354.69. The all-time high close was at 3389.78. The index closed just below that level. The all-time intraday high from Wednesday’s trade reach 3399.54.
  • The NASDAQ index closed up 118.49 points or 1.06% at 11264.95. The close was above the previous high close at 11,210.84. Intraday the pair also traded to a new all time high of 11,283.61.
  • the Dow industrial average lagged the other indices but still closed higher by 46.85 points or 0.17% at 27739.73. It’s high price extended to 27781.46 while the low reached 27526.25.

Late day comments from the CDC that the southern states may have reached a peak and the death rate should start to go down next week helped to push the stocks up near the close.

Apple closed with a market capitalization above $2 trillion for the 1st time. It closed at $473.10 up $10.27 or 2.22%. Microsoft rose by 2.33%. Facebook rose by 2.45% cotton Netflix rose by 2.75%, and Alphabet rose by 2.05%.
In the European markets, the major indices all closed over 1% lower on the day with the UK FTSE leading the way with a decline of -1.61%.

US MARKET : S&P on a 4 day winning streak. Dow on a 3 day streak

NASDAQ pushes higher and erases declines.

The major indices are closing higher on the day with the Dow industrial average leading the way today with a 0.62% gain. IT is the 3rd day in a row that the Dow has moved higher.
The S&P is on a 4 day winning streak. It closed up 0.58%.
The final numbers for the day are showing:
  • S&P index up 18.76 points or 0.58% at 3276.06
  • NASDAQ index up 25.765 points or 0.24% at 10706.12
  • Dpw up 165.33 points or 0.62% at 27005.73
Microsoft has reported better top line and bottom line numbers after the close. The revenues came in at $38.0 billion vs. estimate of $36.54 billion
The earnings-per-share came in at $1.46 vs. estimate of $1.37.
Microsoft shares are trading down 2.19% in early after close trading at $206.65. Shares closed at $211.75.

NASDAQ index rises over 2.50% on the day. New record close

eBay #Sponsored Wallstreet Stock Market Bull and Bear Head Bookends Bronze ElectroplatedThe buyers return to Amazon, Microsoft, Tesla ahead of their earnings over the next 2 weeks

The NASDAQ index rose over 2.5% on the day, outpacing small gains in the S&P index and Dow industrial average (which barely closed above unchanged).
The final numbers are showing:
  • S&P index up 27.11 points or 0.84% to 3251.83. The high price reached 3258.61. The low extended to 3215.16
  • NASDAQ index closed up 263.90 points or 2.51% at 10767.09. That is a record high close for the NASDAQ index
  • Dow industrial average closed up 8.92 points or 0.03% at 26680.83. The high price reached 26765.02. The low extended to 26504.20
Leading the way were some of the years biggest gainers including:
  • Tesla, +9.47% to $1643
  • Amazon, +7.93%
  • Microsoft, +4.3%
Tesla Microsoft will announce their earnings on Wednesday, July 22. Amazon will announce earnings on Thursday, July 30.
After the close IBM has announced higher earnings on the top and bottom line
  • EPS comes in at $2.18 vs. $2.17 estimate
  • revenues came in at $18.12 billion vs. $17.72 billion estimate
IBM shares are up in after hours trading and trades at $130.25 up 3.88% on the day

A big earnings calendar this week.

Stocks trading modestly higher in premarket activity

In premarket trading the major indices have turned back to the upside after earlier declines. The gains are limited however.

This week the earnings calendar really heats up after the financials started the process last week. Below is a look at some of the major releases this week:
Monday, July 20
  • IBM
  • Phillips
Tuesday, July 21
  • Coca-Cola
  • Snap
  • United Airlines
  • Lockheed Martin
  • Texas Instruments
Wednesday, July 22
  • Microsoft
  • Tesla
  • Chipotle
  • Whirlpool
  • Biogen
Thursday, July 23
  • Intel
  • American Airlines
  • AT&T
  • Travelers
  • Hershey
Friday, July 24
  • American Express
  • Honeywell
  • Verizon
  • Schlumberger

Oracle loses challenge to Pentagon’s $10bn cloud computing contract

A federal judge has cleared the way for the US Department of Defense to award its $10bn cloud computing contract to Amazon or Microsoft with a ruling on Friday dismissing a challenge from Oracle. Judge Eric Bruggink of the US Court of Federal Claims dismissed Oracle’s claims that the procurement process violated federal laws meant to ensure a competitive process and was marred by conflicts of interest. Because Oracle could not meet the criteria for the bid, “it cannot demonstrate prejudice as a result of other possible errors in the procurement process,” he wrote. The Pentagon named Amazon and Microsoft as finalists to win the multiyear contract in April, eliminating IBM and Oracle from consideration. It has said it expects to make a final decision by the end of the summer.

Oracle has been complaining about the way the bidding process has been conducted since last year. The company objected to the Pentagon’s decision to award the contact to a single company, rather than breaking it up among several providers, arguing that favours Amazon Web Services as the biggest player in the industry. Oracle has also alleged conflicts of interest over AWS’s hiring of two former defence department employees involved in the Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) procurement process.

 

The company previously filed a complaint with the Government Accountability Office, which was also rejected. Oracle said in a statement: “We look forward to working with the Department of Defense, the Intelligence Community, and other public sector agencies to deploy modern, secure hyperscale cloud solutions that meet their needs.” AWS, which was a defendant in the case alongside the government, said it “stands ready to support and serve what’s most important — the DoD’s mission of protecting the security of our country. The DoD deserves access to the best technology in the world and we are unwavering in our support to their mission.” “We are pleased with the determination made by the US Court of Federal Claims. This reaffirms the DoD’s position: the JEDI Cloud procurement process has been conducted as a fair, full and open competition, which the contracting officer and her team executed in compliance with the law,” said Elissa Smith, a Department of Defense spokeswoman. “DoD has an urgent need to get these critical capabilities in place to support the warfighter and we have multiple military services and Combatant Commands waiting on the availability of JEDI. Our focus continues to be on finalising the award decision.”

My Blackberry Is Not Working! Great Technology Humor

Some great British humor for the weekend, mentioned in a recent Casey Research newsletter. You will hear about Apples (AAPL), Research In Motion’s (RIMM) BlackBerry, and Microsoft’s (MSFT) Windows. By the way, non-techies should know before they watch: Orange is a European cell phone service provider, a dongle is a short wire adapter that connects a computer to an Internet cable, and black spots are wireless dead zones.

Creating A Culture Of Distraction

Distraction is eating away at society. Now that almost everyone has a handheld computer at their disposal 24/7 distraction is life. This is an older video from Microsoft, but worth checking out again. It is a perfect example of how much of our lives are being missed by chatting with someone in cyber space rather than living in the moment:

Too much stimulation is like a massage that never ends–no good. Think about it from an investing perspective too.

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