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Stock Market Rally Rolls On - Money Matters for 11/7/05
Monday on Wall Street brought out the buyers once again as the week-long rally continued without pause. The Nasdaq continued its relentless upward climb toward 2218.15 (a four-year closing high, reached on August 2nd of this year) by taking on nearly nine points, while the Dow grabbed the headlines with a 55-point gain.
The top news stories of the day were moribund at best, with Guidant suing Johnson & Johnson over the latter's refusal to follow through with an announced buyout. J&J's rationale on not closing the deal involves the recall of various devices produced by Guidant, a medical equipment maker.
Elsewhere, the Newspaper Association of America, a long-standing respected industry group, reported that average daily circulation of weekday newspapers fell by 2.6%. Sunday circulation was off 3.1% for the six months ended September, according to their report. Newspapers have been hard hit over the years by various competing media. First radio, the television and most recently, the internet have bitten into newspapers' share of America's attention span.
The news hurt some of the major publishers, but Gannett (GCI), which publishes USA Today plus a slew of other dailies, was up 85 cents. Gannett is one of a handful of media conglomerates that is diversified into all segments of media, though their largest holdings are in the newspaper arena. Shares of Gannett stock have tumbled 20 points in the past year, from 85 to 65. Despite their size and diversity, they still are negatively affected by the youth movement away from print and toward electronic media.
The biggest news of the day, or at least the one the market hung its hat upon, came from the oil fields, where prices for light crude fell once again by more than a dollar and closed under $60 once again. Crude oil prices have been soft for a month and should continue to vacillate and even decline more through the winter as the Northern Hemisphere, where most of the cars and users of gasoline are located. Any decrease in the price of oil and gas is seen as a boon for both business and consumers.
Volume today was less robust than during the past week, though still in an acceptable range. Market internals are still suggestive of further gains in technology, though general mid-caps on the NYSE may not follow through with as much strength.
Our weekly Google News search for the word "recession" was up slightly, to about 5,130, from about 4,900 from last week, but still far from the level that would indicate media hysteria. For instance, a search for "bird flu" returns 56,000 results.
Dow Jones: +55.47; 10,586.23 close
NYSE Advancers: 1815
Nasdaq Advancers: 1703
NYSE New Highs: 95
Nasdaq New Highs: 127
Gold: +2.50; 460.40 close
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