Contributed photo / CBL & Associates Properties Inc. corporate headquarters are in Chattanooga.Quarterly gains
Stocks moved higher in the third quarter ended Friday: * Dixie Group, $5, up 40.4 percent * CBL, $12.14, up 30.4 percent * Unum, $35.31, up 11 percent * Miller Industries, $22.79, up 10.7 percent * Covenant Transport, $19.33, up 7 percent * Astec Industries, $59.87, up 6.6 percent * Mohawk Industries, $200.34, up 5.6 percent * Dow Jones Industrials - 189,308.15, up 2.1 percent * S&P 500 - 2,168.27, up 3.3 percent
Chattanooga's stock-traded companies heated up along with the summertime temperatures this year with a majority of the seven major publicly traded companies boasting double-digit gains in the third quarter.
Investing in Chattanooga paid off handsomely this summer as all of the publicly traded companies based in the Chattanooga area outperformed the overall stock market gains during the three-month period that ended Friday.
Shares of two companies that had dropped in value earlier in 2016 rebounded strongly in the summer quarter.
The Chattanooga-based carpet maker Dixie Group enjoyed a 40 percent jump in the price of its stock in the third quarter.
CBL & Associates Properties, which fell in value after reports of a Securities and Exchange Commission examination of some of its previous loans, announced in August that the SEC review was over and no enforcement actions were being taken. CBL stock rose more than 30 percent in the three-month period ended Friday.
Other Chattanooga companies also boasted share price gains above the overall market increase of 3.3 percent in the Standard & Poor's 500 index.
Chattanooga stocks outperformed the overall market even as major stock indexes set records this summer, thanks mostly to gains in tech stocks.
The S&P 500 technology index climbed 12 percent over the last three months. Apple, the most valuable company in the S&P 500, surged 18 percent, partly on indications of strong sales for the newest iPhones. Microsoft, the next-largest company, rose 13 percent and another tech giant, Google parent Alphabet, was up 14 percent.
"There were a lot of value tech names that were attracting interest at the beginning of the quarter," John Carey, a Boston-based fund manager at Pioneer Investment Management Inc., told Yahoo news. "It was part of a more general move back into names that appeared to be attractively priced, while still offering growth potential. The more defensive stocks had maybe gotten ahead of themselves."
Bond prices sank in the quarter. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note rose to 1.6 percent from 1.56 percent. Stocks that pay high dividends, like utilities and real estate and phone companies, generally traded lower.