The Dow Jones Industrial Average is making moderate gains following two better-than-expected economic reports. As of 1:20 p.m. EST, the Dow is up 39 points, or 0.27%, to 14,287. The S&P 500 was up just 0.1% to 1,541.
There were two U.S. economic releases today.
Report | Period | Result | Previous |
---|---|---|---|
ADP private-sector jobs | February | 198,000 | 215,000 |
Factory orders | January | (2%) | 1.3% |
Source: MarketWatch U.S. Economic Calendar.
ADP Change in Nonfarm Payrolls data by YCharts.
The second economic release came from the Department of Commerce, which reported that factory orders dropped 2% in January. That’s below December’s 1.3% growth but better than analyst expectations of a 2.2% drop. Factory orders include both durable and nondurable goods. Last week the advance report on durable-goods manufacturers showed that durable-goods orders dropped 5.2% in January. This led analysts to lower their expectations for the factory goods report. However, the initial report from the Department of Commerce was slightly too dour, as the drop in durable-goods orders was revised upward to a 4.9% drop for January.
Today’s Dow leader
Today’s Dow leader is Hewlett-Packard Company (NYSE:HPQ), up 3.6% to $21.10. HP is leading the Dow higher for the second day in a row. Yesterday the company announced that it was selected by Teradyne “to improve operational efficiency, reduce network downtime and boost design-phase efficiency for new products” by using HP’s FlexNetwork architecture. While this is a small victory, it shows that HP can continue to innovate and win contracts in the hotly contested networking and enterprise-storage space.
Public-facing wins are a must, as Hewlett-Packard Company (NYSE:HPQ) is undergoing a turnaround under new CEO Meg Whitman. Three members of the company’s board came under fire yesterday from proxy advisory firm ISS, which recommended that investors vote against re-electing Chairman Ray Lane, head of the audit committee; G. Kennedy Thompson; and John Hammergren, the head of the finance and investments committee. All three were in their positions in August of 2011 when HP paid $10.3 billion for Autonomy, which later earned HP a massive $8.8 billion writedown. While Hewlett-Packard Company (NYSE:HPQ) is alleging fraud by Autonomy’s executives, this was the second $8 billion-plus writedown of a recent acquisition by HP in 2012. Meg Whitman certainly has her work cut out for her.
The article HP’s Surge Leads the Dow to a New All-Time High originally appeared on Fool.com.
Dan Dzombak can be found on Twitter @DanDzombak or on his Facebook page, DanDzombak. He has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned.
Copyright © 1995 – 2013 The Motley Fool, LLC. All rights reserved. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.