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U.S Market Update

Tue, Jul 21 2009, 15:32 GMT

TradeTheNews.com

- Investors have multiple tier one earnings reports to reckon with this morning, in addition to Fed Chairman Bernanke's Congressional testimony and more jitters over CIT. The DJIA has sustained modest gains thanks to strong results from Caterpillar and Merck, while the Nasdaq is in negative territory. S&P500 is around even. Treasury prices opened notably lower as the major indices tested the June highs, but as stocks gave back some initial gains bond prices recovered. Yields accelerated to the downside upon the release of Chairman Bernanke's testimony to Congress. Though much of it was covered in his WSJ editorial this morning he did stress that unemployment was likely to remain high into 2011 potentially undermining what is already expected to be a gradual recovery, and for that reason will only consider tightening fiscal policy once the job market shows signs of recovery. The US 10-year has rallied nearly a full point from session lows pushing the yield back towards 3.5%.  The 2-year yield has slid more than 10 basis points from session highs of more than 1% sparking a rallying in fed fund futures contracts.

- Note that three of the four Dow components (CAT, KO, DD and MRK) that reported this morning beat EPS targets but missed revenue expectations; Merck managed to exceed expectations on both the top and bottom lines. Shares of Caterpillar, a widely watched economic bellwether, are up a whopping 10% after the company stomped earnings estimates and offered a very bullish outlook for the full year, with a broad range that is twice the consensus view at its high end. Coca-Cola reported top-line earnings that were a bit ahead of the consensus, although its revenue missed expectations by $500M. Shares of KO are down a few percent in early trading. Note that the company was significantly hurt by FX in the quarter. DuPont's earnings results were much better than expected and the company reaffirmed its 2009 EPS forecast. The company warned, however, that its revenue would remain below par next quarter, noting that it sees Q4 results broadly better than Q3 results. Shares of Merck are up 5% after a solid second-quarter report. Merck executives reiterated that the Schering Plough merger would close in Q4 and said they see continued improvement in top line results.

- Shares of asset managers State Street and Blackrock are both in negative territory this morning. State Street reported a giant after-tax "extra ordinary loss," although operating earnings were mildly better than expected. BlackRock beat top- and bottom-line targets solidly. Assets under management at both firms climbed showed sequential improvements, although STT reported q/q revenue declines in key product segments. Note that a BLK executive said clients are beginning to ask if they have "too much cash" and look to move into other asset classes with more risk. Competitor Legg Mason is bucking this trend, up 3% after returning to profitability for the first time since early 2008. Weak results from Zions Bancorp and Regions Financial are pulling down the other regional banks, with ZION down 10% and RF down 14%. Both reported disastrous ROE and ROA figures, boding ill for other regionals.

- While quarterly results from Texas Instruments were not as dramatically good as those out of Intel last week, they were still very strong, with operating earnings about one third ahead of the consensus view, gross margins headed back toward normal levels and order up 27% sequentially. TXN's outlook for next quarter is better than the Street's, although it warned demand trends remain uncertain. Nevertheless investors are selling shares of TXN, with the name down nearly 5% in early trading. Small enterprise software firm JDA Software is up 30% after a very strong quarterly report.

- Two more major US airlines reported huge quarterly losses this morning, on the heels of American last Wednesday. Continental's loss was in line with expectations, while United's loss was slightly smaller than projected. Southwest Air also reported quarterly results, which were more or less in line with analysts' estimates. Shares of UAUA are up 7%, while CAL and LUV are down 6%. Continental's president said that business travel has stabilized at low levels and warned there is no visibility as of yet on autumn travel demand. All three airlines continue to slash capacity, with promises of more reductions in coming quarters.

- In currencies, New York trading saw USD profit taking from the European session abate as better corporate earnings from Caterpillar and other major US corporations sharpened risk appetite. Sovereign accounts are continuing to show buying interest around 1.4190, indicating more reserve diversification. EUR/USD managed to break above the 1.4250 level for fresh six-week highs. BoE's Bean commented that Q2 GDP would likely be negative and said he was uncertain about the durability of any UK housing market recovery. CAD was also in the spotlight as the Bank of Canada left its key interest rate unchanged at 0.25% (as expected) and removed a key line from its statement regarding concern about the "unprecedented, rapid appreciation" of CAD, helping the currency firm above the 1.10 level. Dealers noted that the BoC's statement showed hardly any protest over the strong CAD. Energy and metals hit fresh session highs as a result.

Published on  Tue, Jul 21 2009, 15:33 GMT