News Summary for July 26, 2011
This is your Benzinga news summary and traders' outlook for Tuesday, July 26, 2011, covering headlines from overnight and Tuesday's pre-market session.
Today in domestic pre-market trading, U.S. equity futures are trading higher after strong earnings from several blue-chip companies. The U.S. dollar is trading over 0.5% lower as there is still no decision reached about the debt ceiling.
Earlier this morning, Piper Jaffray upgraded Volterra Semi (NASDAQ: VLTR) to Overweight and Deutsche Bank upgraded Navios Maritime (NYSE: NMM) to Outperform. View all of today's upgrades here.
Piper Jaffray downgraded Computer Programs (NASDAQ: CPSI) to Neutral. Goldman Sachs downgraded HCA (NYSE: HCA) to Neutral. View all of today's downgrades here.
Goldman Sachs lowered Lender Processing Service's (NYSE: LPS) price target to $21 from $22 and Bank of America lowered SunPower Corp's (NASDAQ: SPWRA) price target to $14 from $15. View all other analyst ratings here.
Overseas, European markets were lower this morning. Britain's FTSE 100 fell about 0.5% and France's CAC 40 slipped 0.9% on the session. Asian stocks were higher on the session as well. China's Shanghai Index rose 0.1%, Japan's Nikkei 225 added 0.5%, and Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index jumped 1.3%.
On the economic calendar, the Case/Shiller housing data is due at 9:00 a.m. Consumer confidence, the Richmond Fed Manufacturing Index, and new home sales are set to be reported at 10:00 a.m.
On the commodity front, gold and silver futures are flat in pre-market trading, with gold near the $1611 per ounce level. Energy futures are slightly higher with crude oil up around 0.5%, and gasoline futures are trading near the 3.09 level; however, natural gas futures are down over 0.5%. Finally, cooper futures are higher by about 1%.
On the earnings front, Ford (NYSE: F) reported Q2 EPS of $0.65 on revenues of $35.5 billion; The Street was looking for $0.60 per share on revenues of $31.57 billion.
3M (NYSE: MMM) reported Q2 EPS of $1.60 on revenues of $7.7 billion; The Street was looking for $1.60 per share on revenues of $7.6 billion.
Hershey (NYSE: HSY) reported Q2 EPS of $0.56 on revenues of $1.33 billion; The Street was looking for $0.54 per share on revenues of $1.27 billion.
Yesterday, Netflix (NASDAQ: NFLX) reported Q2 EPS of $1.26 on revenues of $788.6 million; The Street was looking for $1.11 per share on revenues of $790.49 million. Shares fell as much as 10% after-hours.
In corporate news, Radioshack (NYSE RSH) announced it would drop T-Mobile and begin to offer Verizon Wireless (NYSE: VZ) products on September 15.
This concludes your news summary for July 26, 2011.
