PortfolioCrafter - Market Commentary 7/25/05
July 25th, 2005 / 10:56 pm / by portfoliocrafter
U.S. stocks finished today’s session at low levels. The Dow fell 54.70 points, to close at 10,596.48. Besides, the Nasdaq fell 13 points, to close at 2,166.74. Meanwhile, the S&P closed at 1,229.03, after falling 4.65 points.
According to the National Association of Realtors, sales of previously owned homes rose 2.7 percent in June to a record seasonally adjusted annual rate of 7.33 million. Also, the inventory of unsold homes rose 3.8 percent to close at 2.653 million, which is a 4.3 month supply at the current sales rate. And, the median sales price of a home rose 14.7 percent year-over-year to a record $219,000. This price represents the fastest appreciation since November 1980.
Crude for September delivery rose 37 cents to close at $59.02 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Crude prices climbed 3 percent on Friday due to investors’ concerns about whether China’s yuan revaluation would lift the country’s demand for oil. However, China’s relaxation of the yuan’s decade-old peg to the dollar had allowed the Chinese currency to appreciate by about 2 percent against the greenback. Therefore, the reevaluation made the price of crude 2 percent cheaper for Chinese refiners.
Teva Pharmaceuticals Ltd. announced that it would pay $7.4 billion to acquire Ivax Corp. After the news, shares of Ivax closed up 10 percent to close at $25.17. On the other hand, Teva was slightly up 0.2 percent, to close at $31.23. This acquisition would mean that Teva will be adding Ivax’s expanding line of proprietary drugs for such illnesses as cancer, asthma, and multiple sclerosis. The deal is expected to close by early next year, and requires antitrust clearance by U.S. and European regulators.
All the best,
Manuel Jesus-Backus
The Portfolio Crafter
