Friday, April 22, 2016

Economic Journal - Friday, 4/22/2016

(as of 7:00 AM PST)

Earnings season is in full swing and yesterday's reports are resulting in an interesting market open.  Technology is getting hit hard, while the rest of the categories are faring well. Key tech titans Alphabet(Google) and Microsoft are sporting significant losses, weighing heavily on the Nasdaq index, while the Dow and S&P 500 Index are both up modestly, with stalwart McDonalds showing impressive revenue and profits.  Overall profits continue to generally beat lowered expectations, but investors appear to be nervous and reading to hit the sell button at any moment.  The commodities sector is also shows a split in the precious metals sector, with Gold on the downside and Silver up over 1%.  You almost never see that type of negative correlation.  Reports indicate that Hedge Funds are loading up on Silver in a speculative bet.  In international news, the Japanese Yen is down heavily against the dollar.  Japan is considering expanding its negative interest rate stimulus strategy.  Europe and Asia markets were mixed in an unexciting day of trading.  At the lofty levels on US markets we expect to see some profit taking and consolidation over the next few weeks. 

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