U.S. MARKET AVERAGES

Market’s early enthusiasm for the day was lost towards the end of the session.

Strong earnings from Aetna (AET: chart), Marriott (MAR: chart), Coca-Cola Enterprises (CCE: chart), Prudential (PRU: chart) and improved sales and earnings forecast from Best Buy (BBY: chart) helped to charge the early rally in the market. However, as day progressed most of the momentum was lost as traders focused on macro economic issues.

Initial claims of jobless were reported by Labor Department at below 300,000 for the previous week indicating that labor conditions remain tight in several key industries. Chicago Fed Governor commented that inflation remains near the upper end of his comfort zone.

Oil traded higher by 7 cents on no apparent news and natural gas rose by 3.5% during the day.

Tech, semiconductor stocks and especially hardware sector stocks faltered at mid-day. Gateway (GTW: chart) said that its CEO will resign immediately ‘to pursue other interests’, Chairman of the company will take over as CEO until the replacement is found. Apple Computer (AAPL: chart) fell another 5.6% and continued its decline that started five days ago. Other tech stock including Microsoft (MSFT: chart), Dell (DELL: chart), IBM (IBM: chart) and EDS (EDS: chart) fell during the day.

Akamai (AKAM: chart) closed higher by 18% on earnings news and broker recommendations.


MOVERS AND SHAKERS

Amkor Technology (AMKR: chart), advanced semiconductor assembly services provider, reported Q4 net earnings of $54 million, or 30 cents a share, reversing from last-year loss of $36.1 million, or 21 cents a share. Revenue surged 42% to $643.5 million from $453.3 million a year ago. The company’s shares jumped 26.5%.

Akamai Technologies (AKAM: chart), Internet content technology company, reported Q4 net earnings of $25.8 million, or 16 cents a share, up 92% from $13.4 million, or 10 cents a share a year ago. Revenue rose to $82.7 million from $57.6 million last year. Analysts had forecast earnings of 15 cents a share on revenue of $79 million. The stock jumped 18.5%.

Navteq Corp (NVT: chart), provider of navigable digital maps, reported Q4 net earnings jump of $27.7 million, or 29 cents a share, up 79% from $15.4 million, or 17 cents a share a year ago, meeting estimates. The company posted revenue of $146 million vs. $119 million. The stock climbed 13.7%.

Best Buy (BBY: chart) lifted its Q4 earnings from continuing operations forecast to $1.25 to $1.30 a share, from its prior forecast of $1.06 to $1.16 a share. The company projects same-store sales gain for Q4 of 6% to 7%, up from the range of 3% to 5% previously forecast. Best Buy also said it plans to open nearly 90 new stores in the U.S. and Canada during its 2007 fiscal year. The stock rose 8.7%.

EResearch Technology (ERES: chart) reported Q4 net earnings fall of $5.3 million, or 10 cents a share, down from $6.96 million, or 13 cents a share, last year, beating estimates of 8 cents a share. Revenue fell to $25.4 million from $27.1 million, in line with expectations. The provider of technology and services to the pharmaceutical, biotech and medical device industries also said that the chief executive plans to retire before the end of 2006. The company’s stock dropped 15.5%.

ECONOMIC NEWS

Thursday morning, the Department of Commerce released its report on wholesale trade in the month of December, showing increases in both wholesale sales and wholesale inventories. The increase in wholesale inventories exceeded economist estimates.

The report showed that wholesale sales rebounded by 1.0 percent in December after falling 0.7 percent in November. The growth came as wholesale sales of durable goods rose 1.3 percent while wholesale sales on non-durable goods rose 0.7 percent.

Wholesale inventories also increased in December, rising by 1.0 percent after an upwardly revised increase of 0.5 percent in November. Economists had expected wholesale inventories to increase by 0.5 percent compared to the 0.4 percent increase originally reported for November.

Subsequently, the December wholesale inventories-to-sales ratio came in at 1.15, unchanged from November. The ratio was down compared to the ratio of 1.17 reported for December of 2004.

The Department of Labor released its report on initial jobless claims in the week ended February 4 on Thursday, showing that jobless claims rose much less than expected. The report also showed that the 4-week moving average fell to its lowest level in almost six years.

The Labor Dept. said that jobless claims rose to 277,000 from the previous week''s unrevised figure of 273,000. Economists had been expecting jobless claims to rebound to 285,000 after showing notable declines in recent weeks.