(By Harry Boxer) The stock market indices had an interesting day today. They gapped up sharply at the opening, got right to resistance and rolled over hard. After Mr. Bernanke spoke, they came down in a little 5-wave strong move downward from 2598 to 2555 on Nasdaq 100. The S&P 500 dropped back from 1361 1/2 down to 1345 1/2. By eleven o'clock, the indices turned around and rallied back to resistance, but then punched through and rallied very strongly. They pulled back early afternoon, and then rallied again to retest the highs for the day on the NDX, but took them out on the S&P 500. They then pulled back to test them only to bounce later in the close, so it was a very strong close for the indices.
Net of the day, the Dow was up 78.33 at 12,805.54, 160 points off its low, the S&P 500 was up 10.03 at 1363.67, 18 points off its low, and the Nasdaq 100 up 14.49 at 2591.65, 37 points off the low.
Advance-declines were a little better than 2 to 1 positive on New York, and 13 1/2 to 11 positive on Nasdaq. Up/down volume was about 2 1/2 to 1 positive on New York, with total volume of 700 million shares. Nasdaq traded 1.75 billion, and had a 4 to 3 positive volume ratio.
TheTechTrader.com board, however, was narrowly mixed. There were quite a few lower-priced stocks that had a big day today, and many of those were biotech stocks. StemCells Inc. (STEM) jumped 93 cents to 1.80, or 107%, on 16.6 million shares, or 3300% in volume. Peregrine Pharmaceuticals Inc. (PPHM) gained 28 cents to 1.34, or 26%, on 7.9 million shares. Anthera Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (ANTH) climbed 27 cents to 1.60, or 20%, on 25.1 million shares.
RiT Technologies Ltd. (RITT) ran 58 cents to 3.50, or 20%, on nearly a half million shares. Complete Genomics, Inc. (GNOM) was up another 26 cents to 2.81, or 10%, on 5.7 million shares. Amyris, Inc. (AMRS) gained 29 cents to 3.29, or 10%. Solazyme, Inc. (SZYM) jumped 95 cents to 13.39, or 7%.
Digital Generation, Inc. (DGIT) advanced 2.19 to 11.80, or 23%, on 3.7 million shares. Odyssey Marine Exploration Inc. (OMEX) gained 62 cents to 4.25, or 17%, on 2 million shares. Fuel-Tech, Inc. (FTEK) ran up 82 cents to 5.39, or 18%. McMoRan Exploration Co. (MMR) jumped 1.45 to 13.14, or 12 1/2%, on 7.2 million shares.
Other gainers of note included Yelp, Inc. (YELP), up 1.59 to 23.02, Rosetta Resources, Inc. (ROSE) up 2.55 to 42.00 even, Web.com Group, Inc. (WWWW) up 1.08 to 18.72, and Guidewire Software, Inc. (GWRE) up 1.41 to 26.88.
In addition, The Mosaic Company (MOS) jumped 2.84 to 58.21, Rock-Tenn Co. (RKT) rose 2.99 to 61.64, IMAX Corporation (IMAX) gained 1.22 to 25.34, Seattle Genetics Inc. (SGEN) advanced 1.18 to 26.49, Theravance Inc. (THRX) rose 1.24 to 30.74, and Idenix Pharmaceuticals Inc. (IDIX) gained 42 cents to 9.99. Onyx Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (ONXX) vaulted 1.66 to 68.30.
The large-cap Nasdaq 100 stocks were fractionally mixed. Apple Inc. (AAPL) was up only 3 cents to 606.94, 3 points off the low, 5 points from the high. Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) was up 92 cents to 215.93. Google Inc. (GOOG) jumped 1.81 to 576.73.
On the downside, point-plus losers included VIVUS Inc. (VVUS), down 2.24 to 26.45, and even lower in the aftermarket, VirnetX Holding Corp (VHC) gave back 1.44 to 38.96, and Netflix, Inc. (NFLX) lost 1.20 to 81.78.
Stepping back and reviewing the hourly chart patterns, the indices had large gap ups at the opening to resistance, pulled back sharply to test support, and then rallied very sharply back to retest the highs to take them out on the S&P 500, but not so on the NDX. We do not have confirmation yet, but we'll see how tomorrow goes.
Good Trading!
Harry