Hot Start for Stocks

• By the tickerspy.com Staff
• On 4:59 pm EST, Monday November 9, 2009

Stocks surged today even though there was little in the way of major economic news or earnings reports to propel the buying, other than the G20 commitment to keep the government money spigots open to support the world economy. We are also moving into the late states of the Q3 earnings report cycle, so going forward something else is going to be needed to support stock prices.

The Vehicle Rental Stocks Index was the top performing tickerspy Index on the day, led by Avis Budget Group (NYSE: CAR - News) with a 9% gain.

The week started out on a positive note for investors, with the S&P surging 2.2%, or 24 points, to reach 1,093. The Dow soared 2.0%, or 204 points, to 10,227 and the Nasdaq jumped 2.0%, or 42 points, to 2,154. Oil moved up $2.00 to $79.43 a barrel, while gold gained $5.90 to close at $1,101.60 an ounce.

On the economic front, the Group of 20 (G20) finance leaders stated over the weekend that they plan to continue backing stimulus efforts by governments until an economic recovery is assured.

In earnings news, shares of Dish Network (Nasdaq: DISH - News) jumped 5.2% after the satellite TV provider announced a special dividend of $2 a share. The company also said it gained 241,000 subscribers during Q3, above various analyst estimates. For the third quarter, Dish earned $80.5 million, or 18 cents a share, down from $92 million, or 20 cents a share, a year ago. Adjusted EPS was 41 cents, coming in 2 cents below the consensus. Revenue slipped -1.5% to $2.89 billion. Set-top box provider EchoStar (Nasdaq: SATS - News) said that it had moved from a loss of -$307.9 million, or -$3.43 per share, last year to a Q3 profit of $293.9 million, or $3.45 per share, this year. The stock inched up 0.6% on the news. Revenue tumbled -22% to $482.9 million. 10 Pro investors counted the stock among their top-15 holdings at the start of Q3. Shares of RadioShack (NYSE: RSH - News) soared 14.3% after the company reported it would start selling Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL - News) iPhones in its stores. Credit Suisse analyst Gary Balter said he expects this will drive more customer traffic to the electronics retailer, resulting in more sales of higher-margin products. He said the iPhone could add 25 cents or more to EPS, and a partnership with Target (NYSE: TGT - News), which will operate RadioShack kiosks in 1,700 stores, could also add an additional 10-15 cents per share. Consequently, he upgraded the stock to "Outperform" from "Neutral," and upped his price target to $25 from $15.

McDonald's (NYSE: MCD - News) saw its shares rise 1.5% after the company reported strong overseas growth. U.S. same-store sales inched down -0.1% last month, but grew 6.4% in Europe and 4.7% in the Asia, Middle East and Africa segment. Worldwide, McDonald's same store sales rose 3.3%. Total sales jumped 10.3%, or 5.2% excluding currency fluctuations. 175 Pro investors counted the stock among their top-15 holdings at the start of Q3.

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Buzz up!