Friends
The FOMC minutes released this afternoon indicated that internally there is more of a battle between the hawks and the doves than we have seen for some time within the Fed. The hawks pushed for a rate hike in September, while the doves still did not see enough inflation pressure to justify one. It appears that the voices of the hawks are getting louder and the likelihood of a rate hike sooner than later is getting higher. Of course, a lousy earnings season, lousy economic numbers and a slippage in the unemployment numbers could back the hawks off and keep a lid on rates. Remember, the Fed Chair always says the Fed is data dependent. Let the data flow.
Stocks gyrated between positive and negative territory throughout the trading session, and by the close the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 15 points to finish the day at 18,144. The S&P 500 was up 2 points to close at 2139. Gold was up a fraction to trade at $1,256 per ounce, while oil was down $.53 to trade at $50.26 per barrel WTI.
We will start to get some significant earnings releases over the next couple of days, including some of the big banks. Earnings season will really kick in though over the next couple of weeks. We’ll let you know as things start to unfold on the earnings front.
Have a nice evening everyone.
