STOCK MARKET WATCH THREAD--Thursday, August 7, 2003--#1

[Maeve]

Thursday, August 7, 2003

COUNTING THE DAYS
DAYS REMAINING IN THE * REGIME 533
REICH-WING RUBBERSTAMP-Congress = DAY 268
DAYS SINCE DEMOCRACY DIED (12/12/00) 2 YEARS, 240 DAYS
WHERE'S OSAMA BIN-LADEN? 1 YEAR, 298 DAYS
WHERE'S SADDAM? WHERE ARE THE WMD'S? - DAY 140
DAYS SINCE ENRON COLLAPSE = 624
Number of Enron Execs in handcuffs = 17
ENRON EXECS CONVICTED = 0
Other Arrests of Execs = 53


U.S. FUTURES & MARKETS INDICATORS

NASDAQ FUTURES...........S&P FUTURES



AT THE CLOSING BELL ON August 6, 2003
Dow 9,061.74 +25.42 (+0.28%)
Nasdaq 1,652.68 -20.82 (-1.24%)
S&P 500 967.08 +1.62 (+0.17%)
10-Yr Bond 4.288% -0.153
Gold futures…352.40 1.20
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

DOW…........NASDAQ…......S&P (auto-update, hit refresh/reload)


GOLD, EURO, YEN and Dollars


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

PIEHOLE ALERT

Heads Up!
Preliminary info on appearances by Bush & Co. throughout the country. Details &
links are added as they become available so check back. And if you know more,
are organizing something, or would like to, contact [e-mail]

For information on protests and other actionsCitizens For Legitimate Government
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[Maeve]

1. Jobless Claims steady

Initial Claims at 390,000

NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - New claims for jobless benefits dipped last week, the government said Thursday, staying under the key level of 400,000 for the third straight week and possibly signaling improvement in the nation's struggling job market.

The number of initial claims for unemployment benefits fell to 390,000 in the week ended Aug. 2 from a revised 393,000 the prior week, the Labor Department said. Economists, on average, expected 395,000 new claims, according to a Reuters poll.

Please note--last week, Initial Claims was touted at 388K and have been revised up to 393K and so give the impression of a drop instead of a rise. The same thing happened last week.

[ozymandius]

2. Whew!! Good morning Maeve.

It been a double whammy today. My son was up alot last night with his fever. It peaked at 102. Now he has the sweats - hopefully a good sign. The second whammy was DU being slower than ever to load. (You might think that a gerbil on a running wheel was powering my modem.) My screen looks like a prototype DU screen with no colored columns and the fonts are all out of whack.

How's it with you?

[Maeve]

6. I remember little ones with fevers

And less sleep....it does sound like you're on the downside of it, tho.
And yes, another slow morning on the board. Probably pick up speed later. I thought you might be having trouble or gotten busy, so I went ahead and started things off.

[ozymandius]

8. Thank you for backing me up.

I had a huge sigh of relief when the stock thread greeted me upon DU finally loading.

I was up before 7. My boy wanted some stories, needed some medicine. My wife needed some sleep. It's been busy around here for sure. I haven't even made coffee yet.

[ozymandius]

3. WrapUp by Mike Hartman

Investors Struggle for Safety

Stocks and bonds performed better today along with the Treasury auction of $18 billion in five-year Notes yielding 3.3%. It went much smoother than the three-year auction yesterday. The bid-to-cover ratio for the five-year treasury auction was 2.48, meaning that there were 2.48 bids for each available bond versus the 1.36 coverage yesterday on the three-year notes. The heavy supply on the shorter end of the yield curve worked to hold back price gains on the two, three and five-year notes, while the 30-year bond took off to regain all of the losses from yesterday’s trading.

Sector Rotation or Survival of the Fittest?

Stocks fared a bit better today with more money going into the large cap blue-chip stocks. Technology has fallen out of favor, and many of the Wall Street pundits are suggesting that it is nothing more than a sector rotation from technology to financials. Today the AMEX SPDR’s Index for the Technology Sector was down nearly a percent, while the Financials Sector Index was up 1.37%.

WHAT ARE THEY THINKING

In closing today, I need for all of you to read the following sentence; think about it for a minute, and hang on to your thought until I come back on Friday. This is absolutely the kind of spin that makes me crazy. People buy into it…hook, line and sinker. Here is the quote straight from our friends at Bloomberg.com,

“Less wealth generated from refinancing may strain economic growth as early as the fourth quarter unless job growth and business investment kicks in soon, some economists said.”

Figure out what is wrong with the above sentence and we’ll revisit that one for the Spin of the Week!

more...

[JNelson6563]

5. great minds run in the

you know the rest! haha (that's great, not same oy!)

Sorry to hear about your son Ozy. Nothing worse than a sick child! Tepid baths can be helpful BTW. I have much experience with these things....

Anyhow, well, if it's any consolation, have a look at the Street. Looks to me they don't know which end is up and that can always make one's own world seem a bit more orderly. ;-)

I wondered why Maeve kicked things off...was hoping it wasn't something dreadful......what is up with the slow mornings at DU?

Enough blather--watching it with you all...

Julie

[JNelson6563]

4. Good Morning Maeve!!

So the old revise-last-month's-numbers trick eh? heh heh Well, it'll probably work, at least for a short time.

The Wrap-up by Mike Hartman:

Stocks and bonds performed better today along with the Treasury auction of $18 billion in five-year Notes yielding 3.3%. It went much smoother than the three-year auction yesterday. The bid-to-cover ratio for the five-year treasury auction was 2.48, meaning that there were 2.48 bids for each available bond versus the 1.36 coverage yesterday on the three-year notes. The heavy supply on the shorter end of the yield curve worked to hold back price gains on the two, three and five-year notes, while the 30-year bond took off to regain all of the losses from yesterday’s trading.

<snip>


WHAT ARE THEY THINKING

In closing today, I need for all of you to read the following sentence; think about it for a minute, and hang on to your thought until I come back on Friday. This is absolutely the kind of spin that makes me crazy. People buy into it…hook, line and sinker. Here is the quote straight from our friends at Bloomberg.com,

“Less wealth generated from refinancing may strain economic growth as early as the fourth quarter unless job growth and business investment kicks in soon, some economists said.”

Figure out what is wrong with the above sentence and we’ll revisit that one for the Spin of the Week!

http://www.financialsense.com/Market/wrapup.htm

Dontcha love it?? "Less wealth may strain economic growth..." Brilliant!!

Should be an interesting day....

Julie

[nolabels]

37. I understand that, they are making money on both ends

Making money on fees, points, and people gaining in personal debt. Now that the spigot has been turned down and credit is drying up because the kick start wasn't working, things could get looking more dismal for a lot more people other than the out of work folks.

The bond maket should be looking up in a couple months. A dissalusioned consumer could be rough though.

[Maeve]

7. Porductivity jumps

Non-farm productivity at 5.7%
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. businesses boosted their productivity sharply during the second quarter, squeezing out more output while ratcheting down labor costs, a Labor Department report showed Thursday.

U.S. non-farm productivity climbed at a robust 5.7 percent rate, more than twice the revised 2.1 percent pace posted during the first three months of the year. That handily exceeded Wall Street economists' forecasts for a 4.1 percent increase in second-quarter productivity and implied companies were becoming leaner and more efficient at boosting their output while keeping costs under control.

Unit labor costs, which economists monitor as a sign of potential wage pressure, declined 2.1 percent during the second quarter after rising 2 percent in the first quarter this year.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
While this is good news, it is also not-so-good for the jobless--"leaner" companies have fewer employees. And cheaper labor means less chance for a raise.

[Maeve]

9. 9:35 and here we go again

I thought I was going to be able to keep the font in black, but..

Dow 9,058.87 -2.87 (-0.03%)
Nasdaq 1,652.36 -0.32 (-0.02%)
S&P 500 966.65 -0.43 (-0.04%)

[JNelson6563]

10. looks to be continuing downward

Dow 9,033.73 -28.01 (-0.31%)
Nasdaq 1,647.07 -5.61 (-0.34%)
S&P 500 964.41 -2.67 (-0.28%)
10-Yr Bond 4.229% -0.059
(9:43)

I will be doingmy part as a patriotic consumer later today, hope that'll help.

Julie

[ozymandius]

13. 9:54 and easing upward

DJIA 9,055.30 -6.44 (-0.07%)
NASDAQ 1,648.69 -3.99 (-0.24%)
S&P 500 965.97 -1.11 (-0.11%)

[htuttle]

11. Did you notice the dollar graphs when the market opened?

It looks like they went straight down against the Euro and the Yen. Gold went steeply up right when the market opened as well.

[JNelson6563]

12. excellent point

that is alarming.

Julie

[ozymandius]

14. No one trusts the dollar today.

Dollar dips, bonds flat

NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - The U.S. dollar edged lower early Thursday while Treasurys were mixed ahead of the last day of a $60 billion refinancing and following a slew of morning economic news.

At around 9:05 a.m. ET, the dollar bought ¥119.82, off ¥0.39, while the euro was at $1.1363, up $0.0027 from late Wednesday.

<..cut..>
Treasurys have been sliding over the past few weeks on concerns that improving economic news will lead to rising interest rates, which wouldn't bode well for bond investors, as it would mean that long-term investments could potentially erode in value. But bonds seemed to show little reaction to the morning's economic news, perhaps due to the upcoming auction.

story

[JNelson6563]

16. nevermind that

there's a rally on the Street! Hurry to the BUY window!!


Dow 9,077.57 +15.83 (+0.17%)
Nasdaq 1,649.95 -2.73 (-0.17%)
S&P 500 967.57 +0.49 (+0.05%)
10-Yr Bond 4.237% -0.051

(10:05)

Julie

[ozymandius]

15. 10:04's mini-bounce

DJIA 9,066.16 4.42 (0.05%)
NASDAQ 1,648.42 -4.26 (-0.26%)
S&P 500 966.45 -0.63 (-0.07%)

[Maeve]

17. Well, we got a 10 o'clock bounce, but it may not hold

The charts at http://finance.yahoo.com/mo show a sharp down, sharp up and fade...
Dow 9,074.14 +12.40 (+0.14%)
Nasdaq 1,649.09 -3.59 (-0.22%)
S&P 500 967.57 +0.49 (+0.05%)

[gratuitous]

18. Waffer theen meent?

Allow me to be the first to offer the fellow at the table in the cartoon a waffer theen meent.

{Movie reference: Monty Python's "The Meaning of Life."}

[Maeve]

20. One of the great gross-out scenes of all time!

:puke:
I prefer the "Christmas in Heaven" and the "Universe song" scenes, myself. But it was an effective end to a troublesome customer...

[ozymandius]

19. Fannie Mae's Loss Risk Is Larger, Computer Models Show

Question: has this hit the trading pits yet?

Fannie Mae, the giant mortgage finance company, faces much bigger losses from interest rate swings than it has publicly disclosed, according to computer models used by the company to estimate the value of its assets and debts.

At the end of last year, the models showed that Fannie Mae's portfolio would have lost $7.5 billion in value if interest rates rose immediately by 1.5 percentage points, internal company documents provided to The New York Times indicated. At that time, the market value of all the assets on Fannie Mae's books, minus all the company's debts, was about $15 billion. So it would have lost roughly half its market value from such a sharp increase in interest rates, according to the models.

With $923 billion in assets, Fannie Mae is the second-largest financial company in the United States, trailing only Citigroup. Fannie Mae, which is sponsored by the federal government, helps keep mortgage rates down by buying mortgages from banks and selling them or its own bonds to investors around the world. But some investors and outside experts say the company has become dangerously large and highly leveraged, with too much debt and not enough equity.

Fannie Mae has not disclosed how much the recent rise in rates affected the market value of its holdings, and analysts have wildly varying estimates. Kenneth Posner, a stock analyst at Morgan Stanley who is bullish on Fannie Mae, said it did not disclose enough information for outside analysts to determine monthly changes in the portfolio's value.

story

[Maeve]

21. Crap! More Enrononomics at work

"There is no reason for anybody to be worried about the company," said Peter Niculescu, Fannie Mae's executive vice president for the mortgage portfolio. "We are very happy, comfortable, and proud of our performance this year in what has turned out to be a very volatile interest rate environment."

Mr. Niculescu declined to say whether Fannie Mae's portfolio had gained or lost value this year

[ozymandius]

22. 10:15 - bounce losing momentum

DJIA 9,065.67 3.93 (+0.04%)

NASDAQ 1,645.24 -7.44 (-0.45%)
S&P 500 966.51 -0.57 (-0.06%)

[Maeve]

23. 10:23 and all fall down again

Dow 9,057.61 -4.13 (-0.05%)
Nasdaq 1,643.20 -9.48 (-0.57%)
S&P 500 965.34 -1.74 (-0.18%)

[Coventina]

24. The "I Ching" on today's market

Good morning!

Today's reading is DEVELOPING changing to SYNERGY. Since Developing came up just a few days ago, I'll focus more on the Synergy hexagram, one I don't think I've seen before.
"In worldly affairs, this is a time when a leader, dependent upon his principles and his sense of correctness, can bring enlightenment and order to those whom he leads." Yikes! Considering the "leader" we have right now, that could be scary. HIS sense of correctness.


I'm going to guess that the market will be up today, probably due to PPT doing heavy lifting for the Chimp in Chief.

[ozymandius]

25. Hold on!

Isn't Gore making an anti-war speech in New York today?

[ozymandius]

26. 10:34 - back in precariously mixed territory

DJIA 9,070.29 8.55 (0.09%)
NASDAQ 1,645.16 -7.52 (-0.46%)
S&P 500 967.36 0.28 (0.03%)

[ozymandius]

27. 10:44 and barely moving

DJIA 9,074.00 12.26 (0.14%)
NASDAQ 1,643.65 -9.03 (-0.55%)
S&P 500 967.42 0.34 (0.04%)

[Maeve]

28. Almost noon, so let's take a look

Dow 9,101.73 +39.99 (+0.44%)
Nasdaq 1,656.41 +3.73 (+0.23%)
S&P 500 971.77 +4.69 (+0.48%)

[ozymandius]

29. going into the lunch hour all in black

11:56
DJIA 9,101.74 40.00 (0.44%)
NASDAQ 1,655.97 3.29 (0.20%)
S&P 500 971.69 4.61 (0.48%)

[jamesinca]

30. Ok ozymandus I need that opinion and I have my $1.75 ready

Where is it going today? Why do you feel it is going there? Are we or have we seen the effects of Bush promising India that he will outsource jobs there even though states are protesting this? Will the lack of, or should I say the overestimation by the govt., on foreign support in Iraq have a big if any effect on the markets? Mostly in the front of my mind, will the latest line of CA governor candidates have an effect on the markets ( Arnold, Arianna, and Lt.Gov Bustamonte)? CA is the sixth largest economy in the world. Do you think it will have a greater effect after the recall election on Oct. 7?

[JNelson6563]

31. the Street is confused

just like the BFEE likes it

Dow 9,081.56 +19.82 (+0.22%)
Nasdaq 1,652.12 -0.56 (-0.03%)
S&P 500 970.01 +2.93 (+0.30%)
10-Yr Bond 4.282% -0.006

12:30--which way will it go from here?

Julie

[Maeve]

32. 1:08 and we are back in black

1:00PM: Stock market gives back a portion of its mid-day gains as the indices edge closer to the unchanged mark... Investors have made few changes to their positions today, weighing pressing concerns about the indices' weakened technical condition against an influx of strong data for the economy's turnaround... The European Central Bank has complemented such reports with its own admission that it see "increasing reason" to expect a gradual recovery in the second half of the year for the region...
Despite this affirmation, the European bourses finished mixed for the day, with Germany's DAX index down 1.5% and London's FTSE Index up 0.6%...
http://finance.yahoo.com/mo

Dow 9,106.28 +44.54 (+0.49%)
Nasdaq 1,656.55 +3.87 (+0.23%)
S&P 500 973.25 +6.17 (+0.64%)

[mrsteve]

33. Numbers at 1:50

Dow 9,106.84 +45.10 (+0.50%)
Nasdaq 1,654.51 +1.83 (+0.11%)
S&P 500 973.35 +6.27 (+0.65%)
10-Yr Bond 4.281% -0.007

Wow, with all the "good news" today (I gotta think that productivity jump was from layoffs and overseas outsourcing) the market has just not jumped up.

What's with that?

[JNelson6563]

34. cause it's buy on rumour and sell

on news...or wait....is it buy on news and sell on rumour...? I forget. haha It's like playing Calvin-ball, the rules change as we go along. ;-)

Julie

[mrsteve]

35. Still hovering at roughly the same point

Dow 9,112.65 +50.91 (+0.56%)
Nasdaq 1,656.45 +3.77 (+0.23%)
S&P 500 974.04 +6.96 (+0.72%)
10-Yr Bond 4.283% -0.005

Ha! Calvin ball. Great reference - I do miss Calvin and Hobbs. :(

Although you are right - the advice seems to go back and forth. Even some of the opinions coming from the people on this board.

[mrsteve]

36. Rah Roh Reorge...

(Okay, my Astro the dog impersonation sounded better in my head than it looks on paper ;))

Dow 9,088.50 +26.76 (+0.30%)
Nasdaq 1,646.76 -5.92 (-0.36%)
S&P 500 970.34 +3.26 (+0.34%)
10-Yr Bond 4.244% -0.044


Things are starting to nose over on an end of day profit taking slide, perhaps?

[Maeve]

38. 3:20 and anyone for dramamine?

Quite the rollercoaster ride today--urp!

Dow 9,134.08 +72.34 (+0.80%)
Nasdaq 1,652.94 +0.26 (+0.02%)
S&P 500 974.89 +7.81 (+0.81%)

[Maeve]

39. And now down to the final wire

Will the market end up mixed, as it has been much of the day, or will the Nasdaq pull up at the very end? Volatility has been the word of the day, no question. Mortgage rates are as high as they've been in a year (and the spin is that "faith in the economy" is pushing them up--wanna buy a watch?)

And it looks like...oh! so close, Nas!
Dow 9,126.45 +64.71 (+0.71%)
Nasdaq 1,652.21 -0.47 (-0.03%)
S&P 500 974.11 +7.03 (+0.73%)

[JNelson6563]

40. interesting day

like always.

Only one more day to live through and then a two day break. Whew!!

BTW Maeve glad you posted last numbers, I caught President Gore's fine speech and couldn't tear myself away. Brilliant. I hope all are able to catch it.

Julie