Paulson Defends the TARP
Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson and Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke testified in Congress today. The purpose of the meeting was to clarify a new direction the Bush Administration is taking. Last week, Paulson did a virtual about-face on the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP). He decided he didn’t...
Financials Takes Another Hit With Citi News
There’s a great website that tracks all the SPDR ETFs. This corporate site does a great job of providing an overview of the market with a helpful color coordination. It’s called the SPDR Map of the Market. It’s a heat map that shows 9 S&P sectors and how well they’re performing...
G-20 Economic Summit: A New World is Born?
President Bush is hosting an economic summit of the G-20. The Group of 20 represents the world’s nineteen largest economies, plus the European Union. Started in 1999, the G-20 meets every year. They convened in São Paulo, Brazil, earlier this year. However, harsh new market realities forced an...
Looking Ahead: Global Recession
This past Spring I read an article from Forbes Publisher, Rich Karlgaard. A well-respected market observer, Karlgaard opined that we would probably not see a recession in its classical form: 2+ consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth. Now Rich has been covering the markets since I was in high school....
As The Economy Stagnates – Short Zale (ZLC)
The market has fallen from great heights since last October. The S&P 500 was trading over 1500 and the Dow broke above 14,000 heading towards 15,000 points. And then it happened. The deluge of bad news started last summer. Despite heroic governmental attempts to stabilize the market, it fell. Rally...
Detroit Sings The Blues
Motown has definitely seen better times than now. Ford (F), General Motors (GM) and privately-owned Chrysler were once titans of American industry. Now it appears they will die off like the dinosaurs they have come to resemble. Even a rescue by the federal government will only postpone the inevitable....
Expectations – Of Jobs and Markets
Picture this: You’re out of work. (For some it may not be that difficult to imagine.) You once pulled in $120K a year, but no more. Instead of seeing a $7K paycheck with generous 401K funding, you’re now staring at weekly $400 unemployment checks. And those only last for 6 months. So you...
Washington: A Venture Capitalist to Detroit?
The auto industry is hurting. Today it became even more evident. Two of the Big Three automakers spoke in unison about their financial woes. The sad part is that we weren’t even surprised. Detroit Automaker Woes According to Bloomberg, General Motors (GM) posted a $4.2 billion loss last quarter....
Wall Street Analysts in Outer Space
The rally was nice while it lasted. The Dow just posted its worst two-day loss since 1987, thanks to yet more dismal news about the economy. The S&P 500 is now down 38% for 2008, and if the year ends this way it will be the worst annual performance since 1937. Setting aside short-term movements,...
Consumer Staples Still Win In This Economy (XLP)
Maybe an Obama election wasn’t such a good thing for the market. Today, the Dow closed down -486 points and the S&P 500 followed suit by dropping -5.3%. True, one day does not make a market. But when that day happens to follow the biggest election turnout in a generation, it tends to suggest more...
