Gain In Building Permits Boosts Markets
August 16, 2012 at 05:51 AM EDT
The markets extended its gains during the midday with the Dow climbing 68 points to 13,232 as permits for new home construction climbed to a four-year high. Nasdaq gained 24 points to 3055.On the upsideAlcatel-Lucent (NYSE: ALU) launched a consulting and professional services practice to support application programming interfaces. The New York Post reported that Coinstar (Nasdaq: CSTR) may be acquired by a private equity firm.GameStop (NYSE: GME) reported lower second quarter earnings but the results topped estimates.On the downsideAgilent Technologies (NYSE: A) disappointed with lower third quarter earnings that fell short of expectations and forecast current quarter earnings below estimates. Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT) reported higher second quarter earnings but revenue missed expectations.Second quarter earnings and revenue rose for NetEase (Nasdaq: NTES) but the results fell short of expectations.In the broad market, advancing issues outpaced decliners by a margin of nearly 7 to 3 on the NYSE and by more than 5 to 3 on Nasdaq. The Russell 2000 which tracks small cap stocks gained 4 points to 808.