Weekly Wrap

Woooooo-hooooo honey, I can feel the dew drip off those cool green leaves!!!

No, I'm not biting into a York Peppermint Pattie, but if this continues, I'd be an overzealous actress for one of their next commercials. The market was UP this week. Up Up and Away, in my beautiful, my beautiful, balloooooooon.

It's been so long since I've been able to write the word "up", allow me to be silly.

The Dow was up 335 points or 3.5% this past week, the S & P was up 4.9% and the Nasdaq was up 14%!!! Fourteen percent!! Ten plus four more percent!! UP! And you know why don't you?? The Chicks' book came out on Tuesday!

Below are a couple of charts that track the Dow and the Nasdaq to date. Put your curser on the little red balls, (head out of gutter, Chicky) to find the date. On April 10th, the day our book was released, the Dow closed at 10,103 and the Nasdaq closed at 1785. Since the book came out, we have gone nowhere but up!! Let's keep our fingers crossed that a whole cross section of independent women (don't get me singing) will jump into the market and turn it around. We will see no more bears, only Chicks... running with bulls. This is only a prediction and a secret wish of mine; so don't sue me if we see a few more of those hairy bears' butts as they run away.

Dow Year-ToDate

Nasdaq Year-To-Date

Speaking of having their head in the gutter, Yahoo (YHOO) went through a hairy butt experience of their own this week. Yahoo was caught red-handed selling pornographic and adult videos on their site. It was a big topic of discussion on the Chick board. That's the last thing a Chick would support and we would even question owning the stock. Yahoo management quickly removed the pornographic products from their shopping, auctions and classified Web pages. The company also said that they would no longer sign any new contracts for banner advertisements for adult merchandise. For more Yahoo news, Chick Cheryl summarized on her message board post.

Yahoo also came out with their earnings this past week. Shares of the Internet media giant beat first-quarter earnings expectations but lowered its second-quarter earnings guidance. On Thursday shares rose nearly 7 percent, or $1.10, to $16.96. Yahoooooo... for their earnings announcement and not their oblivion to what they happen to be selling on their site.

Chick Jana's favorite online grocer, Webvan's (WBVN) CEO, George Shaheen resigned on Friday. He said that a different kind of executive is needed to run the company so it doesn't make sense for him to stay. COO Robert Swan will take over for Shaheen until a permanent successor is appointed. I wonder if their lettuce is wilting.

Chick-held Cisco (CSCO) had a double-digit percentage increase this past week. It was part of the reason that the whole Nasdaq took the balloon ride. Chick Susie is the Chick in our club that tracks Cisco, and that she did.

Chick Jeanette has been sloughing off a bit on tracking her GE. I'm sure she didn't even know that they came out with their earnings this week. She's in the middle of doing people's taxes... like 40 tax-returns a day. That's the beauty of a club though... when life gets hectic, you're down and you need a helping hand... you just call out my name, and you know wherever I am... I'll come running...

So I'm here... General Electric, (GE) came out with their earnings this past week. The largest U.S. company in terms of market cap, said Thursday that its first-quarter profit rose 16 percent to $3 billion despite a slowdown in the U.S. economy. Wooooo-hooooo... can you feel the dew dripping off the cool green lights? It was in line with analysts' expectations and shares of GE rose 3% on the news! Let's hope this is the beginning of their electric coming back on as it's been a disappointing past six months. GE's stock reached a 52-week high of $60.50 on Aug. 28 and proceeded to drop to a one-year low of $36.42 on March 22.

Retail sales were also announced this past week.and they weren't good. In this mini-bear market, it looks like that last thing people are doing is buying. Shares of most of the retail stocks fell, for example.Lowe's (LOW) fell 3%, Dillard Dept. Stores (DDS) fell 19%, Wal-Mart (WMT) fell 1% and Abercrombie and Fitch (ANF) fell 6.5%. Read Chick Megan's post for news on the Gap (GPS).

Kid's clothing retailer, Children's Place (Nasdaq: PLCE) came out with their earnings announcement this past week, and it was equal to the playground slide. They missed Street expectations, (which should be expected these days) and it's stock slid by 15% on the news.

Huge news in our world, as we now have a book for sale on the site.Internet retailer, Amazon (AMZN) rose 9% on the announcement that they would be co-branding with Borders (BGP). Chick Jana heard this news from the guy at Borders when she went in to check on the status of our book. He said they would be shutting down their online bookseller and merging it with Amazon.

Bad News for cell-phone maker Motorola (MOT) this week. They reported a per share loss of nine cents, when comparing it to a year ago. They had a twenty-one cent per share gain. It should be interesting to see what the stock does on Monday.and who it is going to bring down with them.

I just hope I don't have too be looking at any more of those hairy butts.

Chick Karin

Closing Market Numbers