U.S. MARKET AVERAGES

Leaderless session!

After a week of hectic market climbs driven by a batch of economic news, retail store sales and expected rise in interest rate, today’s session saw a little activity. Few earnings reports, non-farm payroll growth and a downgrade of Apple computer were the only news market had to digest.

Fluor Corp (FLR: chart), a construction company, AON Corp (AOC: chart), an insurance broker, Sanmina SCI Corp (SANM: chart), an electronic manufacturer and Fortune Brands (FO: chart) a conglomerate, reported better than expected earnings. These stocks advanced in an otherwise weak market.

Energy stocks fell 2.5% after rising better than more than 5% for the week with the decline of more than 2% in crude oil price. Shares of Tesoro Corp (TSO: chart) and Valero Energy (VLO: chart) declined 8% and 4.5%.

News of non-farm payroll growth of 56,000 for the previous week failed to meet the expected rise of 100,000. Market rose in the morning on the news but failed to hold on to the gains at mid-session.

MOVERS AND SHAKERS

Diversified industrial group Honeywell International (HON: chart) announced it would buy back as much as $3 billion of its common stock. The transaction would stand for nearly 10% of the company's 856 million shares outstanding. The company’s stock gained 1.5% yesterday and gained 1.33% today.

Online travel agent Expedia Inc. (EXPE: chart) reported third-quarter earnings and revenue that came above analyst expectations. The company gained from increased worldwide merchant hotel revenue, contributions from recent acquisitions and growth in its car rental business. Expedia’s stock added 10%.

Apple Computer Inc. (AAPL: chart) was downgraded by Prudential Equity Group to ‘neutral-weight’ from ‘overweight’. The financial broker cited the recent valuation in the company's stock and said it expects a strong first quarter and fiscal 2006, but it believes the stock has now fully ignored this reality. Apple’s stock dropped 1.13%.

ECONOMIC NEWS

Friday morning, the Department of Labor released its report on the employment situation in the month of October, showing that the U.S. economy added fewer jobs than economists had been expecting.

The report showed that non-farm payrolls rose by 56,000 jobs in October following a revised decrease of 8,000 in September. The increase came in well below economist expectations of an increase of about 110,000.

Additionally, Kathleen Utgoff, commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, noted that the relatively weak growth in the labor market was not attributable to the areas directly affected by Hurricane Katrina.

“Rather, job growth in the remainder of the country appeared to be below trend in October,” Utgoff said. However, she noted, “It is possible, of course, that employment growth for the nation could have been held down by indirect effects of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.’.

The report also showed that the unemployment rate edged down to 5.0 percent in October from 5.1 percent in September, reflecting a smaller labor force. Economists had been expecting the unemployment rate to remain unchanged at 5.1 percent.

The weaker than expected job growth may raise some concern about the strength of the labor market and the economy as a whole.

INTERNATIONAL MARKET NEWS

Asian-Pacific benchmarks closed generally higher with the Nikkei hitting a four-year high above 14,000, boosted by upbeat U.S. economic data and strong confidence in the domestic economy. The index climbed 1.3% on record gains in microchip and banking stocks. Across the region, South Korea’s Kospi rose 0.3%, Singapore Straits Times advanced 0.5%, while the only loser Hong Kong fell 0.3% on property stocks.

European markets finished lower, hurt by U.S. payroll data, showing weaker job growth in October. The German DAX 30 lost 0.2%, the French CAC 40 shed 0.3%, while London’s FTSE 100 remained flat, supported by oil majors like BP and royal Dutch Shell.