Technology
Traders, Keep an Eye on Chip Stocks

Traders, Keep an Eye on Chip Stocks

Semiconductors have been a weak spot in technology for most of the year. But now the group may be trying to break out. The Market Vectors Semiconductor ETF (SMH) is challenging an old peak from earlier this month. It comes at a time when the broader technology sector...

A Weak End to a Strong Season: Earnings This Week

A Weak End to a Strong Season: Earnings This Week

A good earnings season ended on a weak note, thanks to dinosaur consumer stocks. Traditional retailers and food stocks are down sharply as changes in the ecosystem continue to weigh on sentiment. Some beat estimates, others missed. Either way, investors looked for...

More Techs Coming to Life

More Techs Coming to Life

Tech stocks keep jumping as stocks nudge higher. Yesterday, we covered how names like Apple (AAPL) and Cisco Systems (CSCO) were sneaking to new highs. Today that trend continued as other prominent technology stocks also hit new records. First and foremost is...

Someone Just Made a Killing in this Software Stock: Options Recap

Someone Just Made a Killing in this Software Stock: Options Recap

Someone made a killing in a cloud-software company. Just look at the options. Call volume spiked yesterday in Workday (WDAY), which shot to a new all-time high on Tuesday and is up 23 percent in the last month. It looks like the investor rang the register on a winning...

Big Caps on the Move: Scanning for Breakouts in the Dow

Big Caps on the Move: Scanning for Breakouts in the Dow

It's pretty quiet today as stocks drift aimlessly before Labor Day. Dog days of summer? More like the sloth days ... Still, some members of the Dow Jones Industrial Average are melting to new highs even as the broader market snoozes in the shade. Here's a quick tool...

Last Week Shows Records Were Made to Be Broken

Last Week Shows Records Were Made to Be Broken

As the saying goes: Records were made to be broken. Just take the market last week. The S&P 500's decade-long bull run surpassed the lifespan of its previous upward journey in the 1990s. Another record fell on Tuesday, when the Russell 2000 Index hit a new...

New Companies Back on the Rise

New Companies Back on the Rise

Back in the spring, there was a wave of bullishness in initial public offerings. After a few pullbacks, some of those companies are pushing higher again. Take a name like ZScaler (ZS), which provides cloud-computing security services. It chopped around after crushing...

Goldilocks Drives S&P 500 to New Highs

Goldilocks Drives S&P 500 to New Highs

If the longest bull market in history had a patron saint, it would be Goldilocks. This Wednesday marked the 3,453rd session in the uptrend that began on March 9, 2009. That outlasted the earlier run between late 1990 and early 2000. While improving economics and...

Calls Spike as Small Cap Goes Mobile: Options Recap

Calls Spike as Small Cap Goes Mobile: Options Recap

Last month, Market Insights highlighted a surging maker of smart-phone games. Yesterday, options traders lit up the name. Here's a breakdown of the large transactions detected in Glu Mobile (GLUU): A block of 5,500 September 5.50 calls was bought for $2.04. A block of...

Retail Revival Underway: Earnings This Week

Retail Revival Underway: Earnings This Week

Remember when everyone thought traditional retailers were going extinct? This week's earnings reports may have destroyed that narrative. "This is the healthiest environment I have ever seen," Target (TGT) CEO Brian Cornell told CNBC as his stock shot into record...