Friends
After last week’s economic fireworks, we begin to focus on earnings season and how companies are faring in this confusing environment. Remember, there were a whole lot of excuses about bad weather in the first quarter, and that won’t fly in the second quarter. A few companies have pre-warned, but for the most part companies have been quiet, so they better deliver.
Stocks in the meantime spent the entire trading session in negative territory, emboldening the more vocal bears. But it is way too early to judge what direction we are heading next. Sure we have seen stock prices rising for some time now, so a pullback would not surprise anyone (it may actually be welcome by some), but until we see some earnings reports, I wouldn’t want to commit to either direction.
By the close, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 44 points to finish the day at 17,023. The S&P 500 was down 7 points to close at 1977. Gold was down $1 to trade at $1319 per ounce, while oil was down $.59 to trade at $103.47 per barrel WTI.
Let’s buckle up and get ready for earnings season. Stock prices are not cheap anymore, so we need some follow through from Corporate America to justify the levels that we are sitting at. We’ll let you know how earnings season unfolds over the next few weeks.
Have a nice evening everyone.
