Special to the Town Crier
Stock Report
The parties are over, holiday decorations have come down and Wall Street begins the new year facing a new currency, an impeachment trial and uncertain corporate earnings.
However, three hours into trading early Monday morning the market was up more than 140 points.
For 1999, the Town Crier Stock Index added four new corporate companies with local connections.
Added are Yahoo!, Inc., Infoseek Corp., Rambus Inc. and Symantec Corp. The addition of those corporations brings the total of stocks in the index to 50. Buying $1,000 in each listed company on the Town Crier Stock Index will be a market exposure of $50,000 for 1999.
For the fourth year in a row, the stock index showed an increase. For 1998, the increase was 32.28 percent.
Compared to the Dow Industrial with a 16 percent increase, and the Russell 2000, a proxy for small caps, down 3.4 percent for the year, the Town Crier Stock Index could satisfy many an investor. On an investment of $46,000, a Town Crier index investor could have earned $16,281.
Leading the Town Crier Stock Index for the year was Cisco Corp. with an increase of 229.69 percent, followed by Apple Computer with 211 percent, Legato Systems at 199 percent, Network Appliance at 150 percent, Flextronics Intl. at 148.2 percent and Sun Microsystems at 114 percent.
Losing companies were large cap technology stocks like Varian Associates, National Semiconductor, Leasing Solutions, and VLSI. Small cap stocks showing decreased equity positions were Coherent Inc., Celeritek, Digital Microwave, Micro Linear and Innerdyne.
For the coming year, Wall Street will have to digest a full plate of economic data, starting the first week in January. While mixed reports may create some confusion over the direction of the economy, one market analyst thinks it will again be up to the Federal Reserve to keep the market rolling.
A censure or a trial for President Clinton will have a lot to do with the direction of the market. If it drags on, investors are going to want to know if the country is in a crisis.
Technologies will again show mixed results for the year. Any company that is associated with the Internet should do well. Look for mergers and buyouts of small cap companies in Silicon Valley before the year is over.
Many companies in Silicon Valley have not reported their fourth quarter earnings so be prepared for a spate of further negative pre-announcements and significant downward revisions in fourth quarter 1998 earnings.