Friends
Well, I didn’t see this one coming. Yes, we have had some intraday volatility and October was shaping up to be a pretty good month for the bulls, but today the bears seemed to run for the hills. Fueled by what seemed to be some massive short covering, stocks surged into positive territory from the open and continued to try to add to the gains as the trading session wore on. Ok, McDonalds had good earnings, but that can’t account for most of today’s move. Perhaps the ECB’s Mario Draghi’s determination to add stimulus (QE) in the EU provided the dovish fuel that these markets have been feasting on for years now.
Anyway, by the close the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 320 points to finish the day at 17,489. The S&P 500 was up 33 points to close at 2052. Gold was down $1 to trade at $1166 per ounce, while oil was up $.27 to trade at $45.47 per barrel WTI.
Once again, earnings season has not been a mitigated disaster, but the bulls sure wouldn’t want to declare victory just yet. It’s been about a fifty/fifty proposition so far with regards to positive earnings news, but it does appear that the market in general had been positioned rather cautiously as we entered the reporting period. We opined as we entered this earnings season the expectations were very low. It does seem like that was, indeed, the case. Let’s see how the week wraps up tomorrow.
Have a nice evening everyone.
