The 5 Most Disappointing Major Stocks of Tuesday

August 25, 2015 by Jon C. Ogg

Tuesday turned out to be a seriously ugly day for the stock market. By some counts it was even uglier than Monday’s sloppy session due to how it closed on the lows after such a big gap higher. The Dow Jones Industrial Average traded up as high as 16,312.94 after closing at 15,871.35 on Monday – so Tuesday was up 2.8% at one point. Unfortunately, the Dow closed down 1.3%, down almost 205 points, at 15,666.44.

24/7 Wall St. has matched up five stock which are sector leaders that seemed to be the most disappointing stocks among their peers. 24/7 Wall St. has warned about this in recent days, but investors will just have to assume that analysts now have to lower their big upside price targets even if they keep “Buy” ratings on their major stocks. If the typical buy ratings come with 8% to 15% upside you have to expect more cuts.

These are our 5 most disappointment and discouraging moves rather than just the 5 worst stocks on the day, based upon how we view the importance of each company versus their peers. These were shown in alphabetical order to avoid any confusion or ranking.

Chevron Corporation (NYSE: CVX) gapped up big, up at $74.99, it hit a quick high of $75.00, and then sold off. Chevron tried to hold support at $72.50 to $72.60 but after 3:15 it couldn’t hold. At 3:25 it went negative and ended up closing down $2.10 (-2.9%). A drop of 2.9% doesn’t sound catastrophic, not until you consider that this was down 6.7% from its high of the day. Chevron is now down about 46% from its 52-week high, and its average volume of 8.7 million shares was more than doubled as 19.1 million shares traded hands.

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General Electric Company (NYSE: GE) was a serious disappointment as the market is supposed to be rewarding its effort to go industrial. After gapping up 3.6% at $24,73, that was its high on the day and it never looked back. GE was almost flat at 2:00 pm, and by 3:25 it was breaking down into the red. GE shares closed down 2.5% at $23.27 on the day — closing down just a hair under 6% from its high of the day. With a high of $28.68 in the last 52-weeks, GE shares are now down 19% from its 52-week high of $28.68. GE’s volume of 53.1 million shares was handily higher than the 30.6 million shares traded on average.

Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOGL) closed down 0.9% at $612.47 after having been up almost 5% earlier in the day. That is after trading up as high as $647.00 — where $632 was support at 10:30 am and 1:45 pm, but then failed to hold as support at 3:25 before hitting the skids. Google’s “L” shares are now down over 14% from its peak. Google traded 3.2 million shares versus an average of about 2.4 million. By going negative on the day, Google’s market cap on Yahoo was just under $400 billion again.

Merck & Co. Inc. (NYSE: MRK) closed down -5.2% at $51.17. What is so damaging here is that Merck tried to gap up at a high of $55.39, and that was the high print. This means that Merck dropped by 7.6% from the high down to the low. So much for being a defensive DJIA Big Pharma stock. Merck is now even down over 19% from its 52-week high. Merck traded 19.9 million shares on Tuesday, up handily from the 9.7 million shares on average.

Wells Fargo & Company (NYSE: WFC) literally stunk up the joint on Tuesday. It did not matter that this is still the safest bank, nor that Warren Buffett is its biggest holder. Wells Fargo gapped up massively and hit a high just above $53.60, but shares closed down at $50.02 for a close only 2-cents above the low of the day. That makes Wells Fargo’s swing from the closing price versus the highest price a move of -6.7%. The closing price of $50.02 was down 2.4%, and this is now down right at 15% from its 52-week and all-time high. Wells Fargo trades an average of 15.3 million shares per day, but some 27.9 million shares moved in Tuesday’s session.

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