The January 18 – 22 business week will begin one day late, due to Martin Luther King Jr holiday, leaving only Tuesday to Friday for market action to be staged. The most notable economic data releases will be the Housing Market Index (HMI) and Housing Starts numbers; while Treasury International Capital data, the Producer's Price
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Crude Oil The oil issue has been speculative to this point. It's hard to argue against 90 dollar oil when we saw 145 in July 2008, but the fundamentals aren't congruent with the price growth we've seen and this trader finds it easier to argue FOR $60/ barrel oil. Crude supply in the U.S. remains
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Earnings season officially began, as the first member of the S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average to grab Q4 2009 earnings headlines, Alcoa (AA), reported a net profit of $0.01 EPS on Monday, January 11. The shortfall to the $0.06 EPS market consensus was explained by CEO Klaus Kleinfield by the unexpected weakness in the dollar,
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Monday Three and six month treasury bonds will be auctioned at 11:30 am Monday and will kick off the monthly test of the demand for short term investment security. The dollar is becoming stronger and rumors, spawned from the announcement of Bond King Bill Gross's "Lehman high" cash levels, are beginning to spur renewed debate
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The broad measure of the U.S. Equity market, the S&P 500, has found it's way out of a deep hole, dug by the October Employment Situation report that toted headline unemployment at 10.2%. Perhaps giving way to the resilient tone among investors in U.S. firms, this Monday through Wednesday have announced little new economic data, yet
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The appetite of new entrants tip toeing into U.S. equities seems to have worn thin. Following three straight days of declines in the S&P 500 and founded on data citing 38,000 additional weekly jobless claims (637,000 wk 5/9), equities moved slightly higher. The S&P 500 improved by 9 points to 893, drawing bulls to declare
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Worse than expected housing starts, better than expected jobless claims, better than expected Philly Fed Survey, worse than expected Nat Gas Inventories. The churn of Economic data can be exhausting for both "home gamers" and pros.  The only clear facts are that economic conditions are "worsening", regardless of whether or not they are worsening at
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As we finally mailed our checks to Uncle Sam and shed the stress of tax season, Wednesday brought a considerable slew of data to U.S. traders' desks. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) reported slight deflationary price pressure while the level of production in the U.S. dropped further than analysts' estimates during the month of March.
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Tuesday economic reports were victorious in confusing U.S. retail stock investors, as multiple reports could have made the case for bears or bulls depending on how they referenced the numbers. The retail sales report for the entire month of of March came in well below the low end of analysts expectations, where retail sales excluding
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