Tech sector rallied along with the broader market in early trading Thursday, as the stocks traded in high volumes following better-than-expected first-time jobless claims numbers for the week of Oct. 6. PC stocks were among the gainers, even though technology research firm IDC reported that worldwide PC sales declined by 9% in the third quarter from the same period previous year. Later, the technology sector declined 0.23% to lose early gains by the end of Thursday’s trade.
Sprint Nextel Corp. (NYSE:S) is holding talks with Softbank regarding a “substantial investment” by the Japanese mobile carrier, as confirmed by the company. The Wall Street reported earlier in a report that Softbank is in talks at advanced stage to acquire the U.S. based carrier for $12.8 billion, although there were very less details available regarding if the companies might really reach any kind of accord.
Sprint (S) did not confirm that it would accept a full buyout deal.
Sprint confirmed today that it is busy in talks with Softbank regarding a potential large investment by Softbank in Sprint. Such a deal could involve a change of control of Sprint although there are no guarantees for the discussions to result in any transaction or on what terms. Sprint did not want to comment anymore unless companies reached some kind of accord.
Softbank has denied the reports saying they were based on speculation. If potential deal goes ahead it would be the second largest transaction in mobile industry recently.
Earlier Softbank acquired its Japanese mobile infrastructure and services rival eAccess on October 1 in a stock-swap deal valued at $2.3 billion making Softbank the number two mobile phone provider in Japan, with more than 34 million subscribers, behind KDDI’s 40 million subscribers.
Shares of Sprint Nextel Corporation (NYSE:S) traded up 14.29% during trading yesterday, hitting $6.04. The stock has a 52 week low of $2.10 and a 52 week high of $6.04. The company has a market cap of $17.28 billion. The P/S ratio is 0.50 and P/B ratio 1.88. The beta value is 1.13. Sprint Nextel’s RSI amounts to 61.27.
Clearwire Corporation (NASDAQ:CLWR)’s price increased in the last trading session with a previous 52-week high of $2.64. The stock was trading on above-average volume. The stock traded at a volume of 170.13 million shares at a price gain of 70.77%. The share price is now up 101.82% for the past three months. Latest closing price was 43.30% above its 50-day moving average and 36.32% above its 200-day moving average.
While trading at volume higher than average, MetroPCS Communications Inc (NYSE:PCS) plunged -3.32% yesterday. Its previous 52-week high was $14.51 and moved up 27.91% over the same period, trading at a volume of 63.21 million. Shares have risen 38.57% over the trailing 6 months. The stock is currently trading 11.91% above its SMA 50 and 34.83% above its SMA 200.
Alcatel Lucent SA (ADR) (NYSE:ALU) moved down -35.26% in this year and its price history showed most recently beta was at 2.33. Overall the last 12 months, the percentage change in the price was -67.31%, hitting the highest of $3.12 on Oct 14, 2011 while lowest level in that period was $0.91 on Oct 11, 2012.