Nasdaq fails to join the rally at Wall Street

Microsoft leads the pack of twenty seven Dow winners though

U.S. stocks mostly finished higher on Wednesday, 06 November 2013 with the Dow Industrials scoring a record closing high. The major averages registered broad gains at the open, but only the Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 were able to end in positive territory while the Nasdaq posted modest losses.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 128.66 points, or 0.8%, to end at 15,746.88. The S&P 500 advanced 7.52, or 0.4%, to close at 1,770.49. The Nasdaq Composite bucked the positive trend, closing down 7.92 points, or 0.2%, at 3,931.95.

Twenty seven out of thirty Dow components ended hihehr led by Microsoft. The stock climbed 4.2% amid reports Ford Chief Executive Officer Alan Mullaly remains on the list of candidates hoping to replace outgoing CEO Steve Ballmer.

While Microsoft's gain had a limited impact on the price-weighted Dow, the stock provided support to the technology sector which ended ahead of the remaining cyclical groups. Still, the Nasdaq ended modestly lower as biotechnology and momentum names lagged.

In today's economic data, the Conference Board's Index of Leading Indicators increased 0.7% for a second consecutive month in September. The consensus expected the index to increase 0.6%. The index will likely suffer a sizable pullback in October. Initial claims, which added 0.26 percentage points to the increase in the leading indicators, will contribute negatively in October as glitches from California and biases from the government shutdown drove claims to their highest level in several months.

Also, The weekly MBA Mortgage Index fell 7.0% to follow last week's increase of 6.4%. Separately, October Challenger Job Cuts decreased 4.2% after increasing 19.1% in September.

Precious metals traded higher today, gaining support from a weaker dollar index. December gold brushed a session high of $1320.50 per ounce in early morning pit trade and eventually settled with a 0.7% gain at $1317.40 per ounce.

December silver rose to a session high of $21.93 per ounce but then inched lower. It settled with a 0.6% gain at $21.76 per ounce, just above its session low of $21.75 per ounce.

December crude oil also rose on the weaker dollar index. Adding to today's strength was better-than-anticipated inventory data that showed a build of 1.577 mln barrels when a build of 1.6-2.1 mln barrels was expected. The energy component lifted from a session low of $93.68 per barrel set at pit trade open and advanced as high as $95.40 per barrel. It settled 1.4% higher at $94.74 per barrel.

Treasuries settled near their highs, erasing a portion of yesterday's loss. The benchmark 10-yr yield slipped three basis points to 2.65%.

Indian ADRs ended mixed on Wednesday. In the banking space, ICICI Bank slipped 1.7% at $35.72 and HDFC Bank shed 1.3% at $34.73. In the IT space, Infosys gained 1.25% at $53.58 and Wipro was up 0.9% at $11.23. In the other sectors, Tata Motors declined 0.54% at $31.38 and Dr Reddys Laboratories gained 0.7% at $38.81.

Tomorrow, weekly initial claims and the advance Q3 GDP reading will be reported at 8:30 ET while the September Consumer Credit report will be released at 15:00 ET.

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