Lower Close After Trading Halted For Two Days
October 31, 2012 at 11:55 AM EDT
The markets closed lower with the Dow slipping 10 points to 13,096 on cautious trading after Hurricane Sandy halted trading for two days. Nasdaq lost 10 points to 2977.On the upsideActivist investor Carl Icahn acquired a 10% stake in Netflix (Nasdaq: NFLX).Quanta Services (NYSE: PWR) reported sharply higher third quarter earnings that nearly doubled to surpass analyst expectations by a wide margin.HMS Holdings (Nasdaq: HMSY) will repurchase up to $50 million worth of common shares. On the downsideImpax Laboratories (Nasdaq: IPXL) reported higher third quarter earnings and revenue but both fell short of analyst expectations.QEP Resources (NYSE: QEP) fell to a loss for the third quarter as revenue dropped and the company forecast full year gas production below estimates.Lender Processing Services (NYSE: LPS) reported higher third quarter earnings but announced that it will pay $1.8 million to Colorado to settle allegations that the company used unauthorized signatures on mortgage related documents.In the broad market, advancing issues outpaced decliners by a margin of nearly 7 to 5 on the NYSE while and by nearly 5 to 4 on Nasdaq. The Russell 2000 which tracks small cap stocks gained 5 points to 818.
