Friends At first glance, the jobs report was somewhat dismal, but as the onion was peeled back it looked a little better. The non-farm payroll number was an increase of 113,000 new jobs in January which was much lower than the consensus estimate of 181,000 new jobs....
Friends Stocks enjoyed their best day of the new year today, as early gains were actually held for more than a few minutes and then built upon later in the day. Now, before we get too excited, tomorrow we get the all-important jobs report, and that is likely to create...
Friends Volatility continued today as stocks gyrated back and forth between positive and negative territory. Each economic data point and every syllable uttered by a Fed official seemed to send stocks one way or another. On the economic front, ADP estimated that...
Friends Stocks finally bounced a bit today, a “dead cat” bounce perhaps, but a bounce nonetheless. After spending a short time in negative territory, stocks found their footing and despite some weakness early in the 2:00 hour, the bulls were able to hold onto earlier...
Friends Fueled by another weak domestic economic number, today’s being the ISM Manufacturing Index, stocks tumbled once again, as market indexes are heading for the official “correction” moniker. First, a thought about the recent economic weakness. I know it is a “way...
Friends Ok, glad that’s over. January 2014 was a difficult month. It was the first down January we have had since 2010. One thing we can say about 2014 so far, volatility is back. After dropping more than 230 Dow points by midday, stocks tried to stage a late...
Friends Stocks rallied today, helped by a better than expected first look at 4th quarter GDP (3.2% vs. 3% consensus estimate), and a bevy of pretty darn good earnings reports. Traders seemed to direct their focus away from emerging market currency issues for one day...
Friends January is turning into a bit of a mess, isn’t it? Last night’s state of the union address was not market moving, but futures were buoyed overnight by action in Turkey, where they raised rates to defend their currency. It worked for about 10 seconds. By the...
Friends After last week’s struggles, stocks endured a very volatile day. After a nice pop on the open, stocks gave up those gains and fell to negative territory by late morning. The bulls gathered themselves and staged another rally in the early afternoon, only to run...
Friends Stocks fell for the 4th day in a row, leaving the Dow down more than 3% for the week. In addition this was the worst day for the Dow since June of last year. The reason for all the weakness this week has mainly been attributed to the turmoil in emerging...
Friends Fueled by overnight weakness in China, stocks suffered a difficult day. China’s problems revolve around weakening manufacturing data and an economic slowdown which has lingered for some time now. Domestically, the weekly jobless claims were harmless, and LEI...
Friends On this the second day of trading for 2014, stocks saw a little more volatility as the bulls stepped up to the plate in the early afternoon pushing the Dow up 70 points, only to back away once again in the last half hour of trading. With the weather problems...
Friends We have been seeing several cases of stocks priced for perfection suffering sell-offs despite what seems to be decent, if not good earnings reports. We suspected that this might occur this earnings season. Dow components Johnson & Johnson , Verizon,...
Friends The Dow Jones Industrial Average masked a very weak day for stocks. On the economic front, housing starts, as expected were down, and consumer sentiment slipped in December, but industrial production was encouraging. Once again, mixed results. Speaking of...
Friends A couple more good reports from major money center banks and another good day for stocks. Also helping was a better than expected Empire State Manufacturing number which had been lagging other regions of the country, and a hotter, but expected PPI number....
