High-Tech Stocks Go Sky High
The numbers are mind-boggling. Red-hot technology stocks sent the Nasdaq to another record high on Friday for the 22nd time in 31 trading days, CBS News Correspondent Anthony Mason reports.
"Smoking. Red hot. It's never been hotter," Scott Bleier of Prime Charter said of the market for high-tech stocks.
Bleier said some of his clients have never made more money in a six-week period.
"The Internet is being viewed rightly or wrongly as the next industrial revolution," he said.
For the year, the Nasdaq is now up well over 60 percent, more than half of that in the last eight weeks. And in the past month alone, 167 Nasdaq stocks have doubled in value.
If you were lucky enough to have shares of FreeMarkets, an industrial products auction site, the stock jumped 500 percent in its first day of trading on Friday. Those kinds of numbers amaze even the veterans.
"I mean, it's extreme. I'll concede it's extreme," said Larry Wachtel of Prudential Securities.
But Wachtel says there's a method in the madness. It's all about cell phones, computers and semiconductors.
"It's not wild-eyed speculation. It is simply a new development in technology. People are using new 'stuff'. And these stocks reflect that new stuff," said Wachtel.
That's one reason that Christmas cheer is sweeping Wall Street, where $11 billion in bonus money will be paid out by the end of the year.
"At some point the party will end. It's not over yet," said Bleier.
With all that money to spend, it looks like the party is just getting started.
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