Friends
April didn’t exactly end well, but May got off to a pretty good start today. After a quiet start, stocks climbed into positive territory and by the close the Dow had tacked on a triple digit gain. It’s another busy week on the earnings front and being the first week of the month, it is time for the various employment reports. Wednesday we get the private payroll ADP report, Thursday the weekly jobless claims number and then on Friday we get the non-farm payroll number.
As for today’s action in stocks, by the close the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 117 points to finish the day at 17,891. The S&P 500 was up 16 points to close at 2081. Gold was up $2 to trade at $1,293 per ounce, while oil was down $1.02 to trade at $44.90 per barrel WTI.
As mentioned it is employment week, but in addition to that we got ISM and PMI manufacturing today (both just ok), and get the ISM and PMI non-manufacturing (service sector) on Wednesday along with Factory orders. As May gets going there will be plenty for market participants to absorb both on the economy and corporate earnings. We’ll try to help sort it all out as we go.
Have a nice evening everyone.
