Russell opens low Monday morning; AVAV, LOPE, and MFLX lead gainers

Small-cap stocks edged lower this morning, pulled down by ideas Friday’s gains were overdone, by ongoing worries about the credit crisis and the economic recession and by a batch of soft earnings announcements in the small-cap sphere this morning. Losses were limited by optimism about fiscal stimulus plans when President-elect Obama takes office later this month. Some of today’s small-cap gainers are Grand Canyon Education, Inc. (Nasdaq:AVAV), AeroVironment, Inc. (Nasdaq:LOPE) and Multi-Fineline Electronix (Nasdaq:MFLX).

Other Market Watch highlights today included:

• The chart picture retains a positive slant after Friday’s solid close above important resistance points.  
• In overseas action, European markets rose more than 1%, while Asia also gained about 1%.  
• Within the commodity theme, crude oil prices slipped into negative territory ahead of the U.S. open, giving back decent overnight gains amid geopolitical tensions.  
• Mining shares were firm overnight and remain a sector to watch in U.S. trading today.

Small Cap Gainers:

• Grand Canyon Education, Inc. and AeroVironment, Inc. established new 52-week highs shortly after the opening. (See Nasdaq:AVAV, Nasdaq:LOPE)  
• Multi-Fineline Electronix is up 23.5% to $15.17 after raising its Q1 sales outlook this morning. (See Nasdaq:MFLX)  
• Teradyne is up 10.3% to $5.15 after Barclays Capital this morning upgraded the company from "Equal Weight" to "Overweight." (See NYSE:TER)
• Eagle Bulk Shipping and DryShips Inc. are posting gains of 10.2% and 5.1%, respectively, in pre-market trading. (See Nasdaq:EGLE, Nasdaq:DRYS)

Small Cap Losers:

• CONMED Corp. and Digi International established new 52-week lows in early trading. (See Nasdaq:CNMD,Nasdaq:DGII)  
• GSI Commerce, Inc. is down 14.6% after a downgrade this morning by Stifel Nicolaus. (See Nasdaq:GSIC)  
• Helen of Troy Limited is down nearly 11% to $15.80 after a downgrade by JPMorgan. (See Nasdaq:HELE)  
• Varian Semiconductor Equipment is down 5.4% to $17.60 in pre-market trading after issuing revised rev and earnings estimates for Q1. (See Nasdaq:VSEA)

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