Nasdaq volume surges but gains do not
Tech investors were busier than ever in the second quarter, but increased trading may not have made them much money, according to new data.
The Nasdaq recorded its most active day ever during the second quarter, when 3.19 billion shares changed hands April 18. In fact, 11 of the market's most active days ever occurred during the second quarter of the year. Average daily volume on the exchange for the quarter was 1.9 billion shares, an increase of 18.7 percent from the year-ago quarter.
But more trades did not equal more money, as the dollar volume of trading slipped 39.6 percent from a year ago to $2.9 trillion.
The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index ended the quarter down 12.5 percent from the fourth quarter of 2000, and 45.5 percent lower than the first quarter of 2000.
The market value of the more than 4,300 Nasdaq-listed stocks stood at $3.2 trillion at the end of the second quarter, down 41.8 percent from the end of the second quarter of 2000.
The most actively traded stock during the quarter was Cisco Systems, which recorded second-quarter volume of more than 12 billion shares. Rounding out the top five were Intel, Oracle, Sun Microsystems and Microsoft.