Tech Stocks Sink Lower; Intel, AMD Shares Slip

The Wall Street Journal Online

The Nasdaq Composite Index continued to slide Friday following the recent selloff, as an upbeat GDP report failed to ease investors' concerns over the economy.

In afternoon trading, the Nasdaq Composite Index gave up 24.18, or 0.9%, to 2575.40 points, after plunging 1.8% in the previous session on worries over the housing and energy markets. Morgan Stanley's high-tech index lost 4.53 to 637.43 and the Nasdaq 100 Index of nonfinancial stocks shed 15.56 to 1970.53.
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Stocks got an initial lift following a report early Friday that gross domestic product rose at a 3.4% annual rate April through June, but jittery investors shifted back to selling by midday.

Making headlines in the technology sector, shares of Intel slipped 22 cents to $23.78 on the Nasdaq Stock Market after European antitrust authorities charged the company with illegal tactics in competing against rival chip maker Advanced Micro Devices.

The commission said Intel offered computer hardware manufacturers cash payments, rebates and discounts to use its chips instead of AMD's. The Commission described these deals as part of a "single, overall anticompetitive strategy."

Shares of AMD dropped 82 cents, or 5.6%, to $13.91 on the New York Stock Exchange.

QLogic plunged $2.80, or 17%, to $13.87 on Nasdaq after the maker of storage-network infrastructure components reported lower-than-expected first-quarter earnings and revenue. QLogic said its first-quarter earnings fell 9.9% to $19 million, or 12 cents a share, while revenue for the recent quarter rose 2% to $139.8 million.
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Shares of Netgear slid $8.70, or 23%, to $29.12 on Nasdaq after the networking products company said its second-quarter net income fell 38% to $6.13 million, or 17 cents a share. Revenue grew 26% to $164.3 million.

MicroStrategy shares fell $9.24, or 11%, to $76.34 on Nasdaq. The maker of business software posted a 30% drop in net income, and said revenue for the recent quarter rose 14% to $84.8 million as product support and other services revenue rose 24%, offsetting a 6% decline in product-license revenue.

Shares of Microchip Technology lost 11 cents to $37.06 on Nasdaq after the semiconductor company's third-quarter sales growth forecast fell below analysts' revenue estimates. Microchip said revenue for the recent quarter increased slightly to $264.1 million from $262.6 million a year ago, and it expects third-quarter sales to be flat to up to 2%.

Cisco Systems slipped 12 cents to 29.55 on Nasdaq after the company announced it would buy a $150 million stake in software designer VMware's initial public offering. Cisco's board also approved an additional $5 billion worth of stock buybacks, to add to its previous plan for $47 billion in buybacks.

Semiconductor test equipment maker Cohu is up 51 cents to $21.12 on Nasdaq after reporting second-quarter earnings of $2 million. Cohu's earnings fell 57% from the second quarter a year ago, during which the company earned $4.7 million. But its revenue rose to $66.4 million from $61.9 million.

CNet Networks, a media company, dropped 9.4%, or 78 cents, to $7.48 on Nasdaq after it swung to a second-quarter loss of $76,000, compared to earnings of $5.2 million during the same period last year. The company cited costs related to its stock options investigation to explain the loss. CNet's revenue rose to $97.2 million from $92.4 million a year ago.

Varian Semiconductor Equipment Association gained $1.55, or 3.4%, to $46.55 on Nasdaq after the company reported that its fiscal third-quarter revenue had increased by 55% from the same period last year. The chip company's earnings, however, fell to $23.4 million from $24.7 million.