Friends
Stocks tried to move higher today ahead of this week’s FOMC meeting. The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq were successful, while the Dow, being held back by weakness in United Healthcare, continues to struggle. As mentioned, market participants will be focused on the Fed and Wednesday’s decision on interest rates.
As for today, by the close the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 110 points to finish the day at 43,717. The S&P 500 was up 22 points to close at 6,074. The Nasdaq Composite Index was up 247 points to close at 20,173. Gold was down $5 to trade at $2,670 per ounce, while oil was down $.72 to trade at $70.57 per barrel WTI.
We will get a look at retail sales tomorrow and a second revision of 3rd quarter GDP on Thursday. We’ll also get the weekly initial jobless claims and leading economic indicators on Thursday and the PCE price index on Friday so in addition to the Fed’s decision on interest rates on Wednesday we have a lot of additional economic data for the markets to mull over. In the meantime, let’s see if the bulls can generate enough momentum to spark a Santa Claus rally into year-end.
Have a nice evening everyone.
Jim
