Courtesy of Blain.
Thursday saw choppy action in the indexes as it looked like it was going to be a typical bull market type day with morning selling met by buying – but then a late round of selling pushed things back to near break even. The S&P 500 fell 0.08% and NASDAQ 0.06% – not much too read into that. Economic news is on the back burner this week but U.S. March housing starts showed a 0.926 million unit rate, below expectations but above February’s 0.908 million unit rate.
Indexes are where they were yesterday – NASDAQ still poised below old highs but above the wedge it broke out of. The S&P 500 below our upper trend line.
Before we get to earnings it is worth mentioning the IPO of Etsy (ETSY) which we highlighted a month or so ago – often brand names that a good portion of the populace are familiar with do quite well on their IPO and that was the case here.
Shares of arts and crafts retailer Etsy surged in opening trading on the Nasdaq Thursday. After pricing at $16 late Wednesday the stock opened at nearly double that level, and hit a high of $35.73 in morning trading. The stock finished at $30 per share, up 87.5 percent for the day and valuing the company at $3.33 billion. The healthy stock surge shows that Wall Street has a big appetite for a well-known retail brand, even one that doesn’t yet make a profit. Founded in 2005, Brooklyn-based Etsy sells anything from a $110,000 antique desk from the 1800s to a $20 handmade antler pendant and everything in between. In 10 years it’s grown from a scrappy startup offering craftspeople a way to sell necklaces and needlepoint online to a marketplace of 54 million members that generated $1.93 billion in sales in 2014.
There are a lot of financial companies which reported this week. Citigroup (C) posted earnings per share that beat on revenues that missed expectations.
Goldman Sachs (GS) handily beat expectations on both earnings per share and revenue, helped by a burst of trading activity in January when the Swiss central bank removed a cap on the franc. The investment bank also raised its quarterly dividend to 65 cents per share from 60 cents.
In after hours, American Express (AXP) reported first-quarter earnings that beat estimates, but revenue missed. The company cited the “significant impact” from a stronger dollar on its international business. The stock is down a percent or so in after hours.
Shares of the oil equipment provider Schlumberger (SLB) rose about 2% after it topped first-quarter earnings projections, although revenue missed. The company also said it would cut an additional 11,000 jobs, blaming declining drilling activity.
Semiconductors retreated as SanDisk (SNDK) sunk. The company, which makes memory chips used in mobile devices such as Apple Inc.’s iPhone, said sales will fall in 2015 as it loses customers, delays products and chip prices fall. This was one rough chart even before today.
