By Rex Crum
Tech stocks ended the month on a lackluster note Tuesday, as
sector's negative general trend for August held firm with
semiconductor stocks ranking among the biggest decliners.
Among chip stocks, for the month, SanDisk Corp. (SNDK) fell 24%,
Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD) gave up 25%, Broadcom Corp.
(BRCM) shed almost 17% and Intel Corp. (INTC) fell by more than
14%.
The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOX) shed almost 2%
Tuesday and gave up 12% for the month.
Other tech stocks had a rocky session, with the likes of Apple
Inc. and Hewlett-Packard Co. going back and forth and unable to
establish any consistent direction.
The Nasdaq Composite Index (RIXF) had a hard time keeping any
positive momentum, and ended up falling almost 6 points to close at
2,112. For the month, the tech-heavy market gauge gave up more than
6%.
Apple (AAPL) rose 60 cents to $243.10, a day ahead of an event
in San Francisco in which the company is expected to unveil new
models and features of some of its iPod digital media players.
Apple's iPod unit sales have been declining, but revenue from the
devices is up as more customers have bought higher-end models like
the iPod touch, which uses WiFi technology to connect to the
Internet.
H-P (HPQ) shares edged down by 11 cents to close at $38.45. The
company is waiting to find out if Dell Inc. (DELL) plans to counter
or raise H-P's $30-a-share offer for 3Par Inc. (PAR), which the
data-storage company has said it plans to accept.
Dell shares fell 25 cents to $11.77, while 3Par gave up 30 cents
to close at $31.12.
Before the market opened, technology research firm Gartner Inc.
released a report saying it expects worldwide sales of personal
computers to rise 19% in 2010, to a total of 367.8 million units.
Sales growth is likely to slow in down through the second half of
the year, Gartner said.
Among other tech stocks, losses came from EMC Corp. (EMC), IBM
Corp. (IBM), Texas Instruments Inc. (TXN) and Google Inc.
(GOOG).
Research In Motion Ltd. (RIMM) fell $2.75 a share, or 6%, to
$42.84.Before the market opened, analyst James Faucette at Pacific
Crest said in a research note that RIM's new BlackBerry Torch has
failed to boost sales at AT&T Inc. (T), the smartphone's
exclusive carrier in the U.S.
Also, Bernstein Research analyst Pierre Ferragu cut his
estimates and lowered his price target on RIM to $40 from $55,
saying the company is facing more threats from Apple's iPhone and
smartphones running on Google's Android operating system.
Hutchinson Technology Inc. (HTCH) shares fell 59 cents, or more
than 17%, to $2.87, a day after the maker of suspension assemblies
for hard-disk drives rallied nearly 30%.