Friends
Stocks sold off early in the trading session with the Dow down more than 150 points, but did recover to eliminate most of the damage. Goldman Sachs alone accounted for much of the drop in the Dow. Both the aforementioned Goldman and Bank of America had earnings releases this morning and both included some good news and bad. As we’ve seen though, during this earnings season, big banks shares are being sold on the news. Some good earnings numbers were posted by J&J and Netflix. Including Netflix the momentum Nasdaq stocks like Amazon, Apple, Google and Facebook all enjoyed good days.
The early morning dip might have been a reaction to the Republicans inability to get to a vote on a healthcare bill. Though, not a real surprise, given what was being reported, the reality of political failure appeared to sour the mood in early trading. By the close, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 54 points to finish the day at 21,574. The S&P 500 was up one point to close at 2,460. Gold was up $8 to trade at $1,241 per ounce, while oil was up $.42 to trade at $46.44 per barrel WTI.
We get a look at IBM’s earnings after the closing bell, and of course many more as this week and next unfold. We’ll continue to keep score, but it appears that our feeling that this would be a good quarter for earnings is beginning to come to fruition.
Have a nice evening everyone.
