WALL STREET STOCKS OUTLOOK
Stock prices may climb higher today,
riding a two-day advance that saw the Dow Industrials climb 85
points, analysts said. But they cautioned that the market is
due for a pause after such a strong climb and could move into a
short term consolidation today as well.
    Yesterday, the Dow Jones Industrial average closed above
the 2400 mark for the first time ever. Special situations,
airlines and a strong bond market helped push the average up 15
points to end the day at 2406. Gainers led losers by seven-six
on the Big Board, while volume slid slightly to 175 mln shares
from 213 mln shares last Friday.
    "I think we'll get a day that will be, on balance,
positive, but not any record setter," Thom Brown of Butcher and
Singer said.
    Brown said that the market needs a pause before any
stronger advance. "We need a bit of consolidation here," he
said. "Eighty-five points is just too much, too soon."
    Brown added that the market probably will not pay much
attention to the February consumer credit number being released
today. "The market's been ignoring fundamentals," he said.
    "I don't see any problems with the Blue Chips easing higher
today," Chris Callies of Dean Witter said. But she said the
market may have some short term trouble in this 2400 area.
"We're still in the midst of a correction" in the broad market,
she said. "It's not entirely clear that this rally is the end
of the two day correction that began last week."
    In the newspapers -- The Wall Street Journal's Heard on the
Street said some people feel that when Mesa Limited Partnership
provided badly needed assets to NRM Energy in exchange for a
large stake in the company the move may have turned NRM into a
T. Boone Pickens investment fund.
    The New York Times Market Place column said the first half
hour of trading is becoming more important. That is the time
when a large amount of important and growing investment from
Japan and Europe enters the market. Indeed, the column said
that a Salomon Brothers study shows that 44 pct of the market's
total gain during the first two and a half months of this year
came in the first half hour of trading.
 Reuter
