By Rex Crum, MarketWatch
Netflix gains as sector ends day broadly lower
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Several Internet stocks closed
with gains Thursday, but the tech sector ended the day in the
red.
Among tech stocks that posted gains, Netflix Inc. (NFLX) rose
4.5% to close at $449.67. Chief Executive Reed Hastings garnered
some attention when, in a post on Facebook, he said that Netflix
surpassed HBO in terms of subscriber revenue in the previous
quarter.
Gains also came from AOL Inc. (AOL), Priceline.com Inc. (PCLN),
eBay Inc. (EBAY) and Microsoft Corp. (MSFT).
Security software company Symantec Corp. (SYMC) rose 1% to
$23.97. Late Wednesday, Symantec reported a fiscal first-quarter
profit of 45 cents a share, excluding one-time items, on revenue of
$1.74 billion, while Wall Street analysts had forecast Symantec to
earn 42 cents a share on $1.67 billion in sales.
Much of the sector rose early on upbeat reaction to the Labor
Department's report that said initial jobless claims fell below
300,000 last week.
But decliners took over as trading progressed, with losses
coming from Hewlett-Packard Co. (HPQ), Yahoo Inc. (YHOO), Oracle
Corp. (ORCL) and Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN).
Online discount retailer Zulily Inc. (ZU) fell more than 6%, to
$36.76 a share. Late Wednesday, Zulily reported a fiscal
second-quarter profit of 6 cents a share on $285 million in
revenue, while analysts had forecast earnings of 4 cents a share on
revenue of $272 million. The company forecast third-quarter revenue
in a range of $275 million to $287.5 million, while analysts had
pegged sales at $283.3 million.
The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index (RIXF) ended the day down
by 20 points at 4,334.
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