Filed under: Before the bell, Earnings reports, Deals, Google (GOOG), eBay (EBAY), Pfizer (PFE), International Business Machines (IBM), JPMorgan Chase (JPM), Merrill Lynch (MER), Southwest Airlines (LUV), Contl Airlines’B’ (CAL), Economic data

Futures eased slightly this morning as the market sought to catch its breath after sprinting higher Wednesday. All indices had strong gains after better-than-expected first-quarter earnings reports from JPMorgan Chase, Coca-Cola Co., and Intel Corp. The Dow industrials finished up 257 points, or 2.08%, the S&P 500 rose 30 points or 2.27% and the Nasdaq Composite closed up 64 points or 2.8%.

IBM (NYSE: IBM) reported very strong Q1 figures after the close Wednesday. The company had income from continuing operations of $2.3 billion, or $1.65 a share, up from $1.8 billion, or $1.21 a share, a year ago. IBM was aided by the weakness of the U.S. dollar, with some 65% of revenue coming from overseas. eBay also had a good quarter, with profit climbing 22%.

However, there was a disappointing earnings report from Merrill Lynch (NYSE: MER) this morning. The company lost $1.96 billion, or $2.19 a share, compared with net income of $2.16 billion, or $2.26 a share, a year ago, after billions of dollars of writedowns related to the subprime crisis. Merrill plans to cut about 4,000 jobs, or 10% of its workforce. Nokia (NYSE: NOK)’s quarterly income rose 25% to 1.22 billion euros, up from 979 million euros a year earlier, but missing analysts expectations of 1.38 billion euros, according to Bloomberg News. Pfizer (NYSE: PFE) also missed analysts’ estimates for the quarter, with profit falling 18%.

The U.S. dollar hit another all-time low against the euro, while oil prices hit an all-time high of more than $115 a barrel. According to the U.S. Energy Department, inventories of gasoline fell 5.5 million barrels last week. Related to the ongoing increase in oil prices, Continental Airlines reported a loss for the first quarter, while Southwest Airlines earnings declined. However, American Airlines yesterday posted a smaller-than-expected loss.

In the news today, Yahoo! moves closer to deal with Google on outsourcing search advertising, according to the Wall Street Journal. Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) is expected to release earnings this afternoon.

In economic data, unemployment claims for the week ending April 5 will be released at 8:30 a.m. EST; the Philadelphia Fed report will be out at 10:00 a.m.

Share This

This entry was posted on Monday, April 21st, 2008 at 11:23 am and is filed under Stocks News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.