A closely watched Nasdaq exchange traded fund has been pulled higher late this week by Microsoft (NasdaqGS: MSFT), which rose Friday after rallying the previous session.
PowerShares QQQ (NasdaqGM: QQQ) and Microsoft both traded fractionally higher Friday. The Nasdaq-100 ETF is testing a key technical level. [Microsoft Powers Nasdaq ETF Back Near 50-Day Average]
Microsoft shares jumped Thursday after hedge-fund manager David Einhorn said he likes the stock but that Chief Executive Steve Ballmer is the biggest weight on the company.
Microsoft is the Nasdaq ETF’s second-largest holding at 8% of the portfolio. The stock could see action next week as Microsoft and Chinese search engine company Baidu.com (NasdaqGS: BIDU) are close to expanding their partnership in China, Beacon Equity Research said in a report.
“According to media reports, the two companies are set to announce a new partnership agreement as early as next week. Under the partnership agreement, Baidu will take over all paid ads on Bing China, while Microsoft will offer all of the English results for Baidu. Bing is Microsoft’s search engine,” the analysts said in the note. “Bing currently has a 5% market share in China, compared with 76% for Baidu and 19% for Google (NasdaqGS: GOOG).”
PowerShares QQQ
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