Thursday, April 7, 2016

Economic Journal - Thursday, 4/7/2016

(As of 7:20am, PST)

Stocks closed out Wednesday with a solid showing, ending two days of consecutive losses. The Dow finished up 112 points while the S&P500 closed up over 1%. Today is a different story as most indices have opened in the red. Today’s move seems to be triggered by two factors – a drop in oil prices and some hawkish sentiments in the Federal Open Market Committee minutes. The Fed minutes were confusing at best but contained more hawkish statements than experts expected which may be spooking investors. Economic data is light today. The initial jobless claims report gave investors a bit of good news. Claims were down in the most recent week and for the 57th straight week they were below 300,000 which is the longest streak since 1973. In news from around the world, the strength of the yen against the dollar hints of concerns about Japan’s economy. Asian indexes were mixed on the day while most of Europe looks poised to finish in the red. As we close out the week before earnings season, concerns about overvalued P/E’s are putting a lid on any significant market gains. Expect a sideways pattern as we lead up to next week’s kickoff of Q1 earnings season.


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