Friends
January limped to a close today, but after all was said and done, we ended up with the best January we have seen for stock averages since 1997. The day began to the upside but was quickly undercut by a trio of disappointing numbers; consumer confidence (61.1 vs. December’s 64.8 and an expected 67), Chicago PMI and Case-Shiller housing index. After the troika of lousy numbers, stocks fell most of the day, only to recover in the last hour to post mixed results. For the day the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 20 points to finish the month at 12,632. The S&P 500 was down less than a point to finish the month at 1312, which was up more than 4% for the month of January. NASDAQ was the only winner today finishing up 1.90 to close at 2813. Gold was up $7 to close at $1741 and oil was down slightly closing near $98.45 after being up early in the day.
Exxon Mobil led the earnings barrage this morning with record revenues but somewhat sluggish growth numbers that resulted in a drop in the share price of $1.67. After the close we just received Amazon’s earnings which seem to be a little disappointing and its shares look to be down in after-hours trading. We will see how February begins and we look forward to Friday’s non-farm payroll number.
Well, January is in the books and though trading was quiet, it definitely had an upward bias. We’ll take it.
Have a nice evening everyone.
