Stocks Climb Into Positive Territory After Early Loss

The Treasury market has also recovered from earlier losses to trade near unchanged.

Author:: Brian Louis
Publish date:: Apr 8, 1999 11:10 AM EDT

Early indications of a good session for stocks turned sour shortly after the open. However, stocks have rebounded from that modest weakness and major market barometers were little changed around midmorning.

A Wall Street-beating earnings report from

Yahoo!

(YHOO)

and an in-line earnings report from

General Electric

(GE) - Get Report

haven't been that much of a boost to the market.

The

Dow Jones Industrial Average

was up 41 to 10,127.

Yahoo! was up 2 1/8 to 210 5/8. Of course, the stock -- in the wake of its recent announcement that it is acquiring

broadcast.com

(BCST)

and ahead of its earnings report -- has run up dramatically. After the close yesterday, the Internet portal titan posted first-quarter operating earnings of 11 cents a share, beating the 25-analyst

First Call

estimate by 3 cents and the year-ago 2 cents.

GE, meanwhile, before the open reported first-quarter earnings of 65 cents a share, in line with the 13-analyst estimate and up from the year-ago 57 cents. It was down 1 7/16 to 113 1/16.

The

S&P 500

was up 5 to 1332. The

Nasdaq Composite Index

was up 4 to 2548.

The small-cap

Russell 2000

was up fractionally at 398.

TheStreet.com Internet Sector

index was down 2 to 698.

TheStreet.com E-Commerce Index

was up 3 to 126.

Peter Green, director of technical research at

Gruntal

, said the market overall lately has been encouraged in part by a better looking economic growth picture internationally.

He noted that people are also getting more comfortable with the Dow over 10,000.

But overall for the market, "it's still a mixed picture on balance," Green said.

Green sees the Nasdaq Comp declining over the next couple of days and his sense is that the index has topped out short term.

He suspects merger fever will get even bigger going forward because corporations seem to be viewing the international arena more constructively for their international operations going forward. Also, with stock prices high, corporations can use that currency to buy other assets.

The 30-year Treasury bond was down 1/32 to 96 9/32, yielding 5.51%.

On the

New York Stock Exchange

, decliners were beating advancers 1,288 to 1,254 on 252 million shares. On the Nasdaq, winners were leading losers 1,557 to 1,555 on 361 million shares.

On the NYSE, 56 issues had set new 52-week lows while 40 had touched new highs. On the Nasdaq, 57 issues had set new lows while new highs totaled 55.

On the Big Board,

America Online

(AOL)

was most active, with 17 million shares changing hands. It was down 1/2 to 157 1/2.

On the Nasdaq,

Oracle

(ORCL) - Get Report

was most active, with 16 million shares changing hands. It was up 1 5/8, or 8%, to 23 1/8.

10:02 a.m.: Stocks Open in the Red

Major market barometers were mostly softer in the wake of a Wall Street-beating earnings report from

Yahoo!

(YHOO)

after the close yesterday and in-line results from

General Electric

(GE) - Get Report

before the open.

Yahoo! was down 7 3/8 to 199. Meanwhile, GE posted first-quarter earnings of 65 cents a share, in line with the

First Call

13-analyst estimate and up from the year-ago 57 cents. It was down 1 1/2 to 113.

The

Dow Jones Industrial Average

was down 21 to 10,064. The

S&P 500

was down 5 to 1322. The

Nasdaq Composite Index

was down 28 to 2516. The

Russell 2000

was down fractionally at 397.

TheStreet.com Internet Sector

index was down 15 to 685.

TheStreet.com E-Commerce Index

was down 2 to 122.

The 30-year bond was down 8/32 to 96 3/32, yielding 5.52%.

Most Up at Open -- NYSE

Donaldson Lufkin & Jenrette (DLJ) , up 3 to 81

Most Up at Open -- Nasdaq

Yahoo! (YHOO) , up 8 9/16 to 217

: The Internet portal company posted first-quarter operating earnings of 11 cents a share, topping the 25-analyst First Call estimate by 3 cents and the year-ago 2 cents.

Most Down at Open -- NYSE

Royal Dutch (RD) , down 1 5/8 to 51 3/4

Most Down at Open -- Nasdaq

HNC Software (HNCS) , down 12 1/32 to 14 3/4

: The company said it expects first-quarter earnings to fall short of Wall Street expectations. HNC said it expects to post earnings of between 15 and 17 cents a share, below the current First Call eight-analyst consensus estimate of 22 cents.

Credit Suisse First Boston

downgraded HNC to buy from strong buy.