By Rex Crum, MarketWatch
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Positive reaction to the earnings
results from Facebook Inc. and Yelp Inc. led gains across the tech
sector on Thursday, while Intel shares also advanced as the chip
giant named a longtime insider as its new CEO.
The Nasdaq Composite (RIXF) ended the day with a gain of more
than 41 points, or 1.3%, to close at 3,440, while the Philadelphia
Semiconductor Index (SOX) rose 1.4% and the Morgan Stanley
High-Tech Index (MSH) rose 1%.
Facebook (FB) shares rose 5.6%, to close at $28.97 a day after
the social-networking giant reported strong first-quarter revenue
gains, with mobile ad revenue accounting for 30% of the company's
total ad sales of $1.25 billion.
"Facebook's Q1 earnings demonstrated that the company can
consistently deliver advertising growth meaningfully above industry
growth rates and can continue to drive growth in user engagement,
rebutting the two current bear theses on the stock," wrote Victor
Anthony of Topeka Capital in a note to clients on Thursday.
Yelp (YELP) surged more than 27%, to an all-time high close of
$32.22, after the online consumer-review and recommendation company
posted better-than-expected sales gains and narrowed its
first-quarter loss from a year ago. Yelp's results also pointed
toward strong performance in its mobile business and advances in
local-ad sales.
Seagate Technology (STX) shares rose 7.3%, to $39.63, after the
hard-disk drive maker reported upbeat quarterly results late
Wednesday, led by higher sales of products used for Internet
storage.
Intel (INTC) came back from its early losses to rise 12 cents a
share and close at $24.11. The chip giant promoted chief operating
officer Brian Kraznich to CEO. Kraznich will take over as Intel's
CEO on May 16, and replace Paul Otellini, who had previously said
he was retiring.
Two rivals of Intel -- AMD (AMD) and Qualcomm (QCOM)--also
advanced, with AMD shares rising almost 6% and Qualcomm closing
with a gain of 1.6%.
LinkedIn Corp. (LNKD), which reports quarterly results after the
close of trading, rose 3.5%, to close at $201.67 a share. The
company is expected to post strong gains in both revenue and
earnings for the period.
Other gains came from Apple Inc. (AAPL), which rose 1.4% to
close at $445.52 a share, Google Inc. (GOOG), Netflix Inc. (NFLX)
and Applied Materials Inc. (AMAT).
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