TradingMarkets' 7 Stocks You Need To Know About For Friday

Stocks closed higher on Thursday, boosted by a merger in the brokerage industry and a good report from Pepsi. Energy is still in focus-- crude rose 0.44 to close at $66.79.

ETrade (ET | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) is acquiring BrownCo for $1.6 billion.

Pepsi (PEP | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) beat by 0.05 and guided higher. The stock rose 1.44 to close at 56.50.

Final GDP for Q2 was 3.3%, inline. Jobless claims for the week of 9/24 fell 79,000 to 356,000, a larger than expected decline.

Now, here are a few stocks to watch on Friday:

Micron (MU | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) may rally from a pullback. At press time, they had not announced their earnings yet. Look for  (-0.08).

National Semiconductor (NSM | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) has an analyst meeting on Friday.

With Gulf oil production practically at zero, it's hard to imagine the oil service companies not continuing to do well.

American Express (AXP | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) may rally from a pullback. It bounced off its 50-day moving average.

A while back I mentioned this trendline on the weekly chart of Intel (INTC | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating). The stock hit that trendline this week, and bounced a little.

Yellow Roadway (YELL | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) bounced, with some positive stochastic divergence.

Chiquita Brands (CQB | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) was mentioned a couple of days ago. It bounced today, and could possibly continue.

SafeNet (SFNT | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating) got whacked on Thursday, but after the close the company announced it got a $150 contract from the Department of Defense. Bounce on Friday?

Brice Wightman