At about noon ET today, the three major equity indexes remain solidly positive, with the DJIA up nearly 91 points at about 12,872, the Nasdaq up about 24 points at around 2,940, and the S&P 500 is up more than 10 points to 1,354. All have gained ground since the opening. The dollar has gained strength against the euro and the Japanese yen, but lost strength versus the British pound. The dollar index is up 0.05% at 79.766, weaker than where it started the day, up 0.40% at 80.043.

Among the major movers at around noon today are Jingwei International Ltd. (NASDAQ: JNGW), Advance America, Cash Advance Centers Inc. (NYSE: AEA), Itron Inc. (NASDAQ: ITRI), Cybex International Inc. (NASDAQ: CYBI), and HyperDynamics Corp. (NYSE: HDY).

Jingwei is up nearly 45% at $2.10. Volume is more than 30x the daily average of about 3,300 shares traded. The Chinese software company is being taken private.

Advance America is up nearly 32% at $10.43 after posting a new 52-week high of $10.55 early this morning. Volume is more than 60x the daily average of 495,000 shares traded. The cash advance provider is being acquired by Mexico’s Grupo Elektra for $10.50/share, for a total price of about $655 million.

Itron is up more than 24% at $49.84. Volume is nearly 6x the daily average of around 420,000 shares traded. The water and power meter maker is acquiring a smart-meter maker for about $100 million following a better-than-expected earnings report last night. We noted Itron as one of our top five winners/losers this morning.

Cybex is up nearly 23% at $2.29 after posting a new 52-week high of $2.80 earlier this morning. Volume is nearly 8x the daily average of around 50,000 shares traded. The sporting goods maker’s shares were halted briefly this morning on a single-stock circuit breaker. This is the second day in a row that the shares have posted a new high following yesterday’s stellar earnings report.

HyperDynamics is down nearly -31% at $1.40 after posting a new 52-week low of $1.01 earlier this morning. Volume is about 7x the daily average of 3.4 million shares traded. The independent oil & gas exploration and production company reported only non-commercial quantities of hydrocarbons at its offshore West African field. Here’s the killer sentence from HyperDynamics’ announcement:

The indicated oil saturation appears to be residual, suggesting that larger volumes of oil formerly were present in the reservoirs but subsequently leaked out or that these rocks lay on a hydrocarbon migration pathway.

The company’s sole asset is 9,650 square miles of exploration area offshore of Guinea.

Paul Ausick

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