It’s been a long time coming, but perhaps, just perhaps, we’ll start to see reasonable movement in stocks reflecting a realistic assessment of business prospects and the economy. Since the Fed cannot promise more than QE to infinity, markets finally are free to react in a somewhat sane manner. Earlier in the week the IMF reported that the world economic situation was deteriorating. Earnings reports bore this out. Stocks and precious metals reacted consistently with that news. For the week, stocks lost slightly more than 2%. Precious metals slid twice that much.
Week in Review
With Japanese stock markets closed for a holiday, Asian trading volume trended on the light side as stocks declined 0.6%. Europe followed suit with nearly a 1% decline. U.S. stocks dropped 0.3% on abysmally low volume. Perhaps Columbus Day had something to do with that.
Week in Review
With Japanese stock markets closed for a holiday, Asian trading volume trended on the light side as stocks declined 0.6%. Europe followed suit with nearly a 1% decline. U.S. stocks dropped 0.3% on abysmally low volume. Perhaps Columbus Day had something to do with that.
Tuesday, the only real action in Asia came from the People’s Bank of China injecting $42 billion into the money market via reverse repurchase agreements. Stocks overall lacked direction there. In Europe, stocks moved down 0.5%. U.S. markets fell over 0.8% on low volume as reality set in over expected disappointing earnings. Oil shot up over 3% over concern of Middle East tensions.
Wednesday, stocks in Asia fell 0.9%, perhaps related to upcoming earnings reports. Stocks in Europe lost 0.4%, while in the U.S. they dropped 0.6% on low volume. Facebook broke back below the $20 mark, shedding nearly 3%. IBM gave back a little, but has held up remarkably well considering the magnitude of the current tech slide.
Thursday’s headline news said initial U.S. jobless claims plummeted. Here’s the rest of the story. Stocks in Asia declined just slightly. Stocks in Europe rose nearly 1% for no good reason. In the U.S., stocks rose about 0.3% on low volume. Friday, stocks in Asia rose slightly, retracing the previous day’s losses. Europe then retraced some of Thursday’s bizarre gains, closing up about 0.4%. Stocks in the U.S. erased Thursday’s gains, closing down 0.3% on continued low volume.
