By Benjamin Pimentel, MarketWatch
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Technology stocks were mostly in
the red on Friday, as shares of Amazon.com fell sharply after the
online retailer posted disappointing results, even as Google Inc.
and Zynga Inc. rallied.
Amazon (AMZN) was down more than 9% after the company also said
it was considering raising the price of its Prime two-day free
shipping plan by $20 to $40 a year.
"We remain cautious on Amazon's future revenue growth rate given
that fourth-quarter revenue and paid units fell below expectations,
as well as first-quarter guidance," Needham analyst Kerry Rice told
clients in a note.
Amazon was one of the decliners on the S&P 500 (SPX) which
was down 1%. The Nasdaq Composite Index (RIXF) was also off 1% at
4,082, on track to end January down 2%.
The Morgan Stanley High Tech 35 Index (MSH) fell 1.3%, while the
Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOX) gave up a fraction.
On the upside, Google (GOOG) was up 3.4% after the company's
fourth-quarter results pointed solid gains in its core online
advertising business.
"If you only need one paragraph on Google to understand the
quarter, here it is: Overall Google core revenues [excluding
Motorola] accelerated," Bernstein Research analyst Carlos Kirjner
told clients in a note.
Shares of social gaming company Zynga Inc.(ZNGA) also rallied
17% on news that it was acquiring videogame developer NaturalMotion
for $527 million, and reducing its workforce by 15%.
But the tech sector was weighed down by declining shares of
Hewlett-Packard(HPQ) , Apple Inc. (AAPL) and Oracle Corp.(ORCL)
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