So it appears that the Fed might be on the right track after all. Investors and analysts alike seem to be coming to terms with the fact that A.) the economy isnit dead, and B.) things will get better to boot. The result today was a rally in the markets that was led by the tech sector. From a Reuters report:
iPeople are looking ahead for when earnings are going to turn, because it appears the Fed is insistent on getting the economy moving," said John Davidson, chief investment officer at Circle Trust Co., which has $8 billion under management. "People believe this is eventually going to work."
All of the stocks we track in he Stock Watch traded higher, including Apple, though that stock saw less of a boost than did others. Volume was very strong in the Nasdaq as money flowed from safe haven stocks into technology.
Hey, guess what? Software piracy is on the rise in the US as well as the rest of the world. It seems that the secondhanders and freeloaders of the world tend to buy more software when times are good and steal it when times are bad. The Wall Street Journal has a good report on a study released by the Business Software alliance. This is just in time to back up Microsoftis increasingly intrusive means of trying to enforce licensing such as limited the number of times Windows users can upgrade their machines before they have to check in with Microsoft. Look for the company to cite this study when defending against criticism of their policies.
Apple announced the cancellation of their CRT monitors and the fact that they are the first PC company to exclusively offer LCD flat panel displays across their product line. Note that this is actually not the case as the iMacs are still CRT based; this could perhaps be seen as a precursor of things to come. The company also said that they saw 7,700 people sheen through the doors of their first two Apple retail stores and that those people spent a combined total of US$599,000 while there. Not bad for another stupid idea from a company about to go out of business any day now. ;-)
Even more importantly to developers, Apple is now preloading Mac OS X on their computers. The company will be preloading both Mac OS 9.1 and Mac OS X with Mac OS 9.1 being the default OS. Switching over to Mac OS X becomes a few clocks and a restart away. This move was designed to offer incentive for developers to invest resources into porting their apps to Mac OS X, and it comes some 2 months earlier than Apple had previously announced.
Lastly, Apple shipped a new version of Mac OS X Server and WebObjects for Java.
So how did this impact Appleis stock? It moved up, but three whole pennies. Investors seemed unimpressed with the news streaming out of the WWDC, though the Motley Fool published a nice writeup on the Apple Stores, and the affect it will have on Appleis future. AAPL started off the day in positive territory, but quickly took off into Negativeland. It proceeded to bounce back and forth between the red and the black. The stock traded in moderately strong volume in a range of 23.05 - 23.91.
Apple closed at 23.56, a gain of 3 cents (+0.13%), on strong volume of 8,271,000 shares trading hands.
The Nasdaq closed at 2305.59, up 106.71 (+4.85%), on volume of 2,312,280,000 shares trading hands.
The Dow closed at 11337.92, up 36.18 (+0.32%), on volume of 1,179,230,000 shares trading hands.
The S&P 500 closed at 1312.83, up 20.87 (+1.62%).
Adobe closed at 45.49, up 2.98 (+7.01%), on light volume of 3,500,200 shares trading hands.
Akamai has been picked by EDS as the provider of enhanced bandwidth services for EDSis hosting business. AKAM closed at 10.90, up 0.89 (+8.89%), on strong volume of 3,217,400 shares trading hands. Apple is a large shareholder of Akamai.
Earthlink closed at 13.49, up 0.46 (+3.53%), on light volume of 1,601,700 shares trading hands.
IBM has announced a new technology that the company says will allow hard drives of up to 400 GB capacity. IBM closed at 119.04, a gain of 1.60 (+1.36%), on light volume of 8,312,900 shares trading hands.
Macromediais closed at 24.76, a gain of 2.17 (+9.61%), on strong volume of 1,857,200 shares trading hands.
Motorola has their credit rating cut by Standard & Pooris. In the meanwhile, the company has introduced a 600 MHz PowerPC processor. Break out the bubbly. Or Something. MOT closed at 16.54, up 0.94 (+6.03%), on light volume of 10,383,100 shares trading hands.
Dell closed at 25.84, a gain of 1.05 (+4.24%), on light volume of 31,966,100 shares trading hands.
Gateway closed at 18.95, a gain of 0.30 (+1.61%), on light volume of 1,564,200 shares trading hands.
Intel closed at 29.90, a gain of 1.14 (+3.96%), on light volume of 44,026,700 shares trading hands.
Microsoft closed at 68.79, a gain of 0.70 (+1.03%), on strong volume of 51,434,300 shares trading hands.
For full quotes on all the companies mentioned in this article, we have assembled this set of quotes at Yahoo! for your reference. For other stories regarding Appleis stock activity, visit our updated Apple Stock Watch Special Report. You can also check out our Apple Financial Boards, a new moderated forum for Apple Investors and people who are interested in Appleis financial dealings.