Friends So, let me get this straight. Fed Chair Powell mentions that the lower inflation readings we have been seeing are likely “transitory” (not permanent), thus there would seem to be no real push to CUT interest rates anytime soon given the strong employment...

Friends Jim is out of the office this afternoon, but here are a few notes he wanted to share. The ADP private payroll number was a robust 275,000 new jobs added. Friday’s forecast for non-farm payrolls is about 213,000 new jobs having been created in April. Apples...

Friends I mentioned yesterday that Google (Alphabet) was going to announce earnings after the close and that the risk was that the shares had just risen to new all-time highs. Well, combine a disappointing earnings release with a stock that was sitting at all-time...

Friends It’s a big earnings week with Google (Alphabet) announcing their earnings after the close today and Apple after the close tomorrow. Google shares posting new all-time highs today would seem to be in a precarious position going into the release, while Apple has...

Friends At first blush, our first look at 1st quarter GDP was a bit of an eye opener. The economy grew at 3.2% in the 1st quarter which was quite a bit better than the 2.5% that analysts were expecting. But, after further analysis the bears among us noticed that a...

Friends It was quite a wide range of reactions to earnings releases today with Facebook and Microsoft having banner days, while 3M had a miserable earnings release and an equally miserable share price reaction. Pretty much par for the course this earnings season....

Friends Today was a little more difficult for those releasing earnings with Caterpillar and AT&T both struggling while Boeing’s problems produce a more mixed result for its shares. In total the earnings releases that we have seen so far have us just slightly off...

Friends   We got some more, better than expected earnings releases this morning including Coca Cola, United Technologies, Lockheed Martin and Procter and Gamble. Most stocks are reacting well to the positive earnings numbers, with P&G being the exception today....

Friends Earnings season rolls out in force this week and next, but stocks seem rather uninterested to this point. We had a tasty earnings beat from Kimberly Clark this morning, and its shares rose nicely, but the market averages spent the entire trading session...

Friends Jim is traveling today, here are how the markets ended. For the day the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 110 points to close at 26,559. The S&P 500 was up 4 points to finish the day at 2,905. Gold was down a fraction to trade at $1,276 per ounce, while...

Friends More earnings reports and more mixed reaction. For instance, PepsiCo had a wonderful earnings release and the shares went up nicely during the trading session. Netflix stumbled a bit as did its shares for most of the trading session. IBM once again...

Friends Today’s earnings releases produced a mixed bag of share price reactions. Johnson & Johnson had a very nice earnings beat and for the most part the stock reacted positively. United Healthcare had what looked like a nice earnings scorecard but the shares,...

Friends Earnings season is upon us. We had a couple more banks report today, Citi and Goldman Sachs, the latter coming up a bit shy of expectations and contributing to the weakness in the Dow today. But as the week rolls on we'll hear from J&J, Pepsico, IBM, Bank...

Friends A nice earnings release from a Money Center bank, a surge in Disney and a big deal in the oil patch gave stocks a nice boost this morning and the market averages were able to hold onto their gains throughout the trading session. JP Morgan Chase had a very...

Friends It appears that market participants were busy watching coverage from the Masters today, as stocks did little more than drift aimlessly for the entire trading session. On the economic front, the Producer Price Index was a little hotter than expected, while the...