Alcoa (AA) Announces

9:05am (EST)

We got a lot to cover this morning but first let’s go over yesterday’s action.

We knew over the weekend that the market had a pretty good chance of opening higher on Monday although the Dow did make a brief trip into negative territory before finishing the day in the green.

Now that there is somewhat of a plan in place to provide Greece with some relief, the bulls can concentrate on putting out other fires that the bears are hanging their hopes on. Trading was tepid heading into the official kickoff of 1Q earnings last night but the momentum was there from Friday as the Dow closed above 11,000 for the first time since September 2008.

The index finished with a 8 point gain to settle at 11,005 after trading as high as 11,029. Although this is really just a number, it’s a headline grabber and some folks who have been out of the market may start to take notice.

The S&P 500 managed a 2 point pop and closed at 1,196 – just shy of the 1,200 level that we were hoping the bulls would take out. The Nasdaq added 4 points and finished at 2,457 after hitting a fresh high of 2,463.

After the close last night, Alcoa (AA, $14.57, up $0.18) said that it narrowed its first quarter loss as demand for aluminum products picked up and prices improved. The company reported a net loss of $201 million or $0.20 a share versus a net loss of $497 million, or $0.61 a share, in the year ago period. Revenue rose nearly 20% to $4.9 billion.

So how costly is the new healthcare reform going to cost companies? We are going to hear this a lot and it will vary from company to company. We aren’t sure of the exact number for Alcoa but their results included a $295 million, or $0.29 a share, one-time charge related to Obama’s new bill and the closing of two smelters.

Wall Street was expecting earnings of $0.10 a share on revenue of $5.2 billion which excluded the one-time charge. Alcoa would have missed by a penny or maybe even came in matching expectations had it not been for the charge but the stock is holding up well. In pre-market trading, shares are down 16 cents to $14.40.

Once again, we have a lot to cover in our Members Area including an update on Fastenal (FAST, $51.90, up $0.75) which beat earnings estimates.

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