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Market Afternoon – BP plc (NYSE:BP), Macy’s (NYSE:M), Target (NYSE:TGT), Citigroup Inc (NYSE:C)

3 September 2010 No Comment

Half-way through this Thursday’s trading day, and the major US indexes are all up slightly.  The DJIA and S&P 500, if they continue this, will have three consecutive days of positive gains.  The Nasdaq was down slightly Tuesday, but it’s still promising for all investors that the market is continuing upward (even if just slightly) after a bull-day yesterday.  So far, the DJIA is up just 2.04 points, the S&P500 is up 4.67 points, and the Nasdaq is up 12.73 points (A percentage gain of 0.02%, 0.41% and 0.58% respectively).  Although it’s early, it’s a good sign for the economy that the stock market has recovered some of the ground lost during last month’s abysmally poor showing.

According to Benzinga, BP plc (NYSE:BP) is projecting to raise $27.3 billion in capital for costs relating to the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.  The company originally aimed to raise between $20-$30 billion.  Yesterday, the London-based oil giant announced the sale of $363 million in assets in Malaysia.  There’s currently an effort to liquidize further global assets in Pakistan and Vietnam.  BP announced a record loss of $32 billion last quarter, due mostly to the oil spill.  So far, their common stock ADR is up 0.53% for the day.

Overall, economic data is helping to keep stocks up for the day.  The Commerce Department has revised their July data, and stated that factory orders during the time period rose by 0.1%.  They’ve also revised their June data, which now shows a 0.6% decline for the early summer month.  According to the Labor Department, worker productivity for July was down.  However, initial jobless claims for the week declined unexpectedly by approximately 3,000 claims.  The number now rests at 472,000 initial jobless claims; experts had predicted a rise of 1,000 initial jobless claims.  Finally, Ben Bernake reported to a Congressional panel and reassured both them and investors that new regulatory procedures would help prevent a repeat of the economic catastrophe that brought down major financial institution Lehman Brothers (and brought other finance companies to their knees).

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Yesterday, we reported that consumer confidence has risen in contrast to the languid stock market in August.  Retail store reports seem to confirm this data.  For example, Macy’s, Inc (NYSE:M) is reporting that same-store sales increased by 4.3% last month; analysts had anticipated a 4% increase.  Competitor Target (NYSE:TGT) also reported a 1.8% increase in August, which fell just short of the anticipated increase of 2%.  Both companies’ common stock prices were up slightly at the time of writing.  In automotive news, it’s being reported that General Motors Company is expected to announce the price of their initial public offering on November 17th.

Finally for the day, Citigroup, Inc (NYSE:C) is up again so far this Thursday.  The financial heavyweight has been on a tear recently after a rough month of August; its share price has declined 7.04% in the past 30-days.  In contrast, the last 5-days has seen Citi’s share price climb 6.42%, based on reports of financial strength in the economy.  Lately, it seems finance stocks such as Citi’s often closely follow investor sentiment very carefully; despite the professions of strength from both the financial industry ,and reassurance from the FDIC and Ben Bernake, investor wounds from the 2008 disaster still seem fresh on their collective minds.

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