click for video
Excerpt:
U.S. stocks retreated, sending financial shares to their lowest level in five years, on a deteriorating outlook for bank earnings. Rising oil prices pushed crude producers higher, leaving the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index and Dow Jones Industrial Average little changed.
Merrill Lynch & Co., Morgan Stanley and Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. helped lead the drop after Bank of America Corp. cut income estimates for brokerages and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. advised selling bank shares as credit losses linger into 2009. Oil’s second day of gains pushed down Home Depot Inc., General Motors Corp. and United Airlines parent UAL Corp., while sending energy shares to their first advance in four days. American International Group Inc., the largest insurer, tumbled to the lowest since 1997 on Barron’s recommendation to sell the shares.
Almost two stocks fell for each that rose on the New York Stock Exchange. The S&P 500 rose 0.07 point to 1,318. The Dow decreased 0.33, or less than 0.1 percent, to 11,842.36. The Nasdaq Composite Index slipped 20.35, or 0.9 percent, to 2,385.74.
Source:
Most U.S. Stocks Retreat, Led by Financials on Credit Concern
Eric Martin
Bloomberg, June 23 2008
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aZ3JNXU3j5vg
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OT: Good Morning Barry, you may want to take a read at this amusing article in the NYT.
“A ‘Bonfire’ Returns as Heartburn”
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/24/business/24sorkin.html?ref=business
“….But the real excitement — the reason, traders whispered, that Mr. Wolfe must be in attendance — was that the Blackstone Group, the big private equity firm, was minutes away from going public, the largest initial public offering in the United States since 2002. (At the time, he told The New York Observer that a friend was giving him a tour.)
Just then, a CNBC reporter pulled Mr. Wolfe aside to ask him what he made of all the hubbub. Mr. Wolfe paused for a moment to contemplate his answer.
And then, with a wry smile, he delivered a prophetic declaration: “We may be witnessing the end of capitalism as we know it.”…..”
It makes for some light morning reading….
Best regards,
Econolicious
Bloomberg TV just showed a pie chart to the effect that Fed rate rises are overwhelmingly expected by September.
Just amazing that people actually could believe Bernanke’s tough talk. If he is crazy enough to do it, my short ETF’s will love it.
This is the way the world ends, Not with a bang but a whimper. —T.S. Eliot, “The Hollow Men” (1925)
Another sure bearish signal: the guys almost always wrong want you 60% in stocks, only 8% cash. S&P 15% higher by year end than yesterday’s close.
Strategists’ U.S. Allocation Guidelines and Forecasts
Banks are a necessary component of capitalism and will eventually stabilize. It’s a bit strange when people tout an unnecessary company like CROX but disavow a company like Wells Fargo.
http://willworkforjustice.blogspot.com/2008/06/time-to-buy-colonial-bancgroup-inc.html