EBay, Juniper highlight tech gains

Posted by Mgbenka at Thursday, January 17, 2013 |

EBay EBAY
+2.72% shares rose more than 3%, to a multiyear high of $54.89 after the
company’s late-Wednesday earnings report. EBay said that for its 2012 fourth quarter, it earned $751 million, or 57 cents a share, on $4 billion in revenue. Excluding one-time items, eBay would have earned 70 cents a share.




Analysts surveyed by FactSet had forecast eBay to earn 69 cents a share, on sales of $3.98 billion. Chief Executive John Donahoe cited eBay’s mobile business as one of the key drivers of the company’s strong year, as eBay mobile handled $13 billion worth of transactions in 2012 more than double the amount of 2011.

Juniper JNPR
+0.64% pulled back from
its high point, but was still up by 1.4%, at $21.27 a share in the wake of J.P. Morgan analyst Rod Hall raising his rating on the company’s stock to overweight from neutral, and lifting his price target to $25 a share from $21.

In a research note, Hall said there is evidence that the slowdown in spending by telecom carriers is at its low point, and “we believe Juniper is poised to benefit from multiple routing product cycles in 2013.”


all also raised his rating on optical-networking company Infinera Corp. INFN
+5.05% to overweight form
neutral, saying the company is likely to see more demand for some of its newer optical products. Infinera shares rose 6.4%, to $6.95.

But Hall cut his rating on Cisco Systems Inc. CSCO
-0.52% to
underweight, or sell, from neutral, and lowered his price target on the stock to $18 a share from $20. Hall said, in a research note, that Cisco “is exposed to sluggish enterprise spending,” and that he believes the positive investor sentiment, and the company’s share price “have gotten ahead of themselves.”

Intel Corp. INTC
+1.22% rose 1%, to $22.35 a share ahead of the semiconductor giant’s
quarterly results, due after the market close.

Gains also came from Apple Inc. AAPL
-0.51% , Microsoft Corp.
MSFT
+1.06% , Facebook
Inc. FB
+1.06% and Dell Inc.
DELL
+1.51%

DELL
+1.51% The Nasdaq Composite Index
COMP
+0.53% climbed by more than 18
points, to 3,135, while the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index SOX
+1.47% rose 1.6% and
the Morgan Stanley High Tech 35 Index MSH
+0.46% added 0.6%.