Closing Bell: Market up, GM up slightly

Posted Dec 12th 2008 4:00PM by Jon Ogg
Filed under: Ford Motor (F), General Motors (GM), AT and T (T), United Technologies (UTX)

Whether you are a trader or an investor, you were probably as happy as Tom Cruise's "Joel" character in Risky Business to hear the closing bell today. Things were looking so promising this week that the media was pondering whether the bottom of the market had come and gone. That part remains unknown that feeling of bear market rallies has returned. The good news is that the auto snag did not bring about the massive down day as a recovery came in. The retail sales data came in slightly "less-bad" than expected.

General Motors Corporation (NYSE: GM) and Ford Motor Company (NYSE: F) were the two bogeys today. Their fate lies in the chances of NOT going bankrupt, and the cancellation of the bailout from the Senate was only greeted by less selling than one would expected when you saw 20% drops and worse in early trading. The good news is that this did not destroy most stocks as much as many feared earlier today, with GM even managing some gains by the end of the day.

Here are today's unofficial closing bell levels:

Dow 8,629.68 +64.59 (0.75%)
S&P 500 879.74 +6.15 (0.70%)
Nasdaq 1,540.72 +32.84 (2.18%)

Top Analyst Downgrades
Top Analyst Upgrades

AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T) was mixed throughout the day. That almost doesn't seem fair since the company raised its dividend to $0.41 from $0.40. It isn't a huge change, so Wall Street did not really care. Shares were up 0.2% at $28.00 late in the day.

Exelixis, Inc. (NASDAQ: EXEL) was one of the big gainers today after the company entered into a drug development pact with Bristol-Myers Squibb. This is a cancer drug, and it had shares up over 20% late in the day for this small-cap biotech.

United Technologies Corporation (NYSE: UTX) predicted that revenues would decline by 3.3% in 2009 and it put earnings at $4.65 to $5.15, while estimates are $5.03. The company gave additional negative trends in orders, but Wall Street took this as good news today as it was not as bad as what is being seen elsewhere. Shares were actually up almost 2% at $47.90 late in the day.

Waters Corporation (NYSE: WAT) did not escape the selling after the analytical instrument manufacturer warned that revenues and earnings would be under expectations as new orders were not completed. This one took four analyst downgrades and shares were down over 11% at $36.90 late in the day.

Tags: analytical instruments, AnalyticalInstruments, biotech, bristol myers squibb, BristolMyersSquibb, cancer drug, CancerDrug, EXEL, inthenews, retail sales, RetailSales, WAT