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Morning Rage 9.20.2012

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Bad news across the Atlantic continues with a sharp loss in the services industry for European countries. Yesterday, housing starts and permits reports were lower than expected, but still within range of analysis expectations. Existing home sales grew 7.0%.

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Rite Aid Corp. (RAD| +0.77% [1.34]) released earnings reports this morning and posted 41.4M in losses, an improvement from the same quarter of last year’s 94.8M losses. Analysts expected a loss of $0.07 a share and Rite Aid beat the expectation, losing only $0.05 a share.Weekly jobless claims reports are released this morning at 8:30am EST with an expected claim drop at about ten thousand this week. The Philadelphia Fed survey will follow at 10:00am, which is an index of general business and manufacturing conditions. The index is expected to decline, but at a lesser pace than last month.

Other post-earnings stocks to keep your eyes on are Bed, Bath, and Beyond (BBBY | 68.79) which is down $-3.44, or 5%, after higher costs left earnings unable to meet analysts’ expectations. Expectations were higher this quarter because of improved government data on same-industry sales.

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Morning Rage 9.11.2012

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Amazon.com, Inc. (AMZN | $256.67) is down less than a half of a point in pre-market trading. Amazon recently released the HD Kindle Fire, to be available at the end of November. Amazon is competing in a market where PC makers have continually failed to take the dominant position from Apple, which has more than half of the entire tablet market. Apple, Inc. (AAPL | 662.74), which is up 2.25 points in pre-market trading, gets its strength from having multiple matching devices that focus on simplicity for the user. Everything is fluid for the user, including the shape and style of all the products.

The one company capable defeating Apple in my opinion, Google (GOOG | 700.77), which is up almost 7.00 points in pre-market trading, has yet to stamp their logo on the outside of sleek hardware. I would also expect Apple to continue pushing other companies off of its platform by taking over their products and services. Apple will hold on to its dominance for a long time. However, the market is saturated with new iPhones and I don’t expect all of the iPhone 4 users to drop their somewhat new phones to get an iPhone 5, due to release Wednesday. This release will not be the same for Apple.

International trade data will be released today. The important data for US markets is the trade gap between exports and imports. I can’t be sure where the US is exporting to with Europe in a mess and China’s growth slowing for almost half of a year. The trade balance is said to continue higher with an estimate over -44.3 Billion. This report will be released at 8:30am EST. 

Alex Kalish has a masters in economics from Suffolk University.

Contact: alexk@keeneonthemarket.com