Friends,
We had some mixed numbers this morning with the jobless claims coming in a little higher than expected (back over 400,000), but the ISM manufacturing number (52.7) was better than expected. Of course, all this leads up to the non-farm payroll number tomorrow. In the meantime, traders seemed to take a breather after yesterday’s explosion as stocks meandered in a tight range all day. In the end, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 25 points to finish the day at 12,020. The S&P 500 was down 2 points to end at 1244. Gold and oil experienced very little movement as gold remained in the $1748 area and oil right at $100 per barrel WTI. Today’s action was not unusual after experiencing such a big move yesterday, as typically we need to digest gains of that size. It was like we felt after our Thanksgiving meal. We needed a little time to digest all that wonderful food before we could eat again.
We’ll see how we finish off this amazing week with tomorrow’s employment report leading the way first thing in the morning. After last week’s drubbing (the worst Thanksgiving week since 1932!), it would be nice to finish this week off strong. We’ll let you how it all turns out tomorrow. Have a nice evening everyone.
