CLOSING BELL

Dow 10414.14  +85.25, Nasdaq 2237.66  +25.97, S&P 1114.05  +11.58,

The market started off strong in the early morning with broad based gains.  Helping the market was a weaker dollar and earning reports from last week.

What was notable is the later in the day the dollar recovered and turned it into a 

0.4% gain and the market still advanced.  For weeks now the market has reacted inversely to the dollar index.  The gain in the dollar can still be attributed to concerns in the Eurozone with the financial stability of some of the countries after the downgrade in Greece’s debt rating last week.

Commodities came under pressure on the stronger dollar, yet the material sector posted gains.  Most of the gains were due to Alcoa (AA) 15.73  +1.15 after being upgraded by Morgan Stanley.

Financial posted the largest gains rising 1.5% after Baron’s published an article that portrayed banks in a positive light.

Chattem (CHTT) 93.14 +23.16 was the biggest mover today after it was announced that Sanofi-Aventis (SYN) 39.07 -0.04 would purchase the company for 1.9 billion.  

Both Walgreen (WAG) 36.61 -0.03 and ConAgra (CAG) 21.83 -0.33 beat their earnings estimates this morning. Walgreen’s Reported earnings of 0.52 per shares the street was looking for 0.48.  ConAgra reported earnings of 0.52 and the street was looking for 0.47 per share. The company did miss their revenue projections.

Nearly 90% of its components were able to stage an advance.  Support for stocks drove Treasuries sharply out of favor.  The benchmark 10-year Note dropped more than one point to send its yield to a four-month high.  It closed with its yield near 3.68%.


Advancing Sectors: Financials (+1.5%), Consumer Discretionary (+1.3%), Materials (+1.2%), Energy (+1.1%), Tech (+1.1%), Health Care (+1.1%), Telecom (+0.9%), Consumer Staples (+0.8%), Industrials (+0.7%), Utilities (+0.4%)

Declining Sectors: (None)