Stocks on Wall Street Drift Lower in Heavy Trading After Historic Closure

Nichole Harper
31 Oct, 2012
New York City

Stocks on Wall Street traded volatile after a historic two-day market closure. Markets opened smoothly after the exchanges and market makers coordinated activities and used back up facilities. Home Depot and Lowes jumped on the expectations of higher sales after Hurricane Sandy.

[R]11:30 AM New York –Stocks on Wall Street traded volatile after a historic two-day market closure. Markets opened smoothly after the exchanges and market makers coordinated activities and used back up facilities. Home Depot and Lowes jumped on the expectations of higher sales after Hurricane Sandy.[/R]

Stocks on Wall Street opened slightly higher but quickly traded lower after a historic two-day market closure as Hurricane Sandy knocked out power and transit networks in the New York City.

The opening auctions went smooth after all exchanges worked together to coordinate trading and clearing on all-electronic Arca platform operated by the New York Stock Exchange.

However, several market makers and trading firms were operating on back-up power systems and handicapped by the reduced staff as majority of employees struggled to get to work and the city slowly returns to normal.

Trading today is expected to be heavy and brisk as three days of trading is compressed today and money managers are also looking to change portfolio for the last session of the month.

The S&P 500 index and the narrow index of large companies Dow Jones Industrial Average gained more than 0.3% at the opening. However, the tech heavy Nasdaq Composite Index quickly fell to as low as 0.6%.

The Internet and mobile phone connectivity was limited on the trading floor of the New York Stock Exchange after the longest market closure because of the weather since 1888.

Yesterday, the S&P/Case Shiller Index of metropolitan home prices in 20 cities increased 2% in August from a year ago after rising 1.2% increase in July.

Separately, the measure of business activity tracked by the Institute of Supply Management increased to 49.9 in October from 49.7 in September.

Disney to Acquire Lucasfilm for $4.05 Billion

Walt Disney ((DIS)) agreed to acquire Lucasfilm from the producer George Lucas and its Star Wars franchise for $4.05 billion in cash and stock.

Disney also said it will release three new films in the series starting in 2015 and Disney also said that six “Star Wars” films between 197 and 2008 generated a total of $4.4 billion worldwide.

As a part of the deal George Lucas will get 40 million Disney shares and will be the tenth largest shareholder in the company according to the data collected by the research arm of Ticker.com.

Lucasfilm is the third acquisition made by the Disney chief executive Robert Iger from the beginning of his tenure. In 2006, Iger paid $7.4 billion for Pixar Animation controlled by Steve Jobs and in 2009 acquired Marvel Entertainment for just over $4 billion.

Opnet Accepts $1 Billion Offer

Opnet Technologies ((OPNT)) soared 29% to $41.43 after the company agreed to be acquired by Riverbed Technology for $1 billion in stock and cash. Riverbed ((RVBD)) decreased 20%.

Stocks in Focus

Facebook Inc ((FB)) declined 3% after the company accelerated its lock up expiration for stocks issued to employees at the time of public offering.

MasterCard Inc. ((MA)) increased $3.07 to $456.05 and the electronic payments technology said net revenue in the third quarter ending on September jumped 5% to $1.92 billion from $1.82 billion in the same period of last year. Net income in the quarter climbed 8% to $772 million or $6.17 a diluted share compared to $717 million or $5.63 a share a year ago earlier.

Worldwide purchase volume climbed 12% to $676 billion from a year ago and as of September 30 the company’s customers had issued 1.9 billion MasterCard and Maestro-branded cards. Processed transactions increased 24% to 8.7 billion and cross-border volume increased 14%.

Cummins Inc. ((CMI)) gained 79 cents to $94.55 after the diesel engine maker reported revenue in the third quarter ending in September declined 11% to $4.12 billion from $4.63 billion in the same period of last year. Net income in the quarter dropped 22% to $352 million or $1.86 a diluted share compared to $452 million or $2.35 a share a year ago.

Ford Motor Company ((F)) gained 5% to $10.95 after the auto maker reported higher than expected earnings on higher prices and sales in the North American markets offsetting losses in Europe.

General Motors Company ((GM)) soared 6.3% or $1.51 to $24.79 after the automobile company reported revenue in the third quarter ending in September climbed 2% to $37.6 billion from $36.7 billion in the same period of last year. Net earnings in the quarter declined 12% to $1.5 billion or 89 cents a diluted share compared to $1.7 billion or $1.03 a share a year ago period.