(As of 7:21 am pacific)
Stocks drifted up slightly shrugging off economic news
and carried by positive earnings reports from Amazon and Ford. With gains in the early morning session, the
S&P is poised to finish its biggest weekly rally in over a month. After market close yesterday, Amazon reported
earnings that far surpassed estimates, sending shares of the online-commerce
giant up 14% to start today. Ford shares
drifted down, as the auto maker posted its 12th consecutive profitable
quarter. The market was earnings driven
in April as 75% of the 271 companies in the S&P500 who have reported so far
have beat estimates. In economic news,
the Commerce Dept. reported that GDP rose at a 2.2% annualized rate between
January and March of this year, slower than the 3.0% pace in Q4 2011 and lower
than economists forecasts of 2.5%.
Consumer spending picked up to its fastest pace in over a year, while
business spending surprisingly dropped, dragging down the pace of GDP
growth. According to a Thomson
Reuters/University of Michigan sentiment index, the final reading of consumer
sentiment for April rose to 76.4 from 76.2 last month. Economists expected the final reading to
remain at the preliminary level of 75.7.
In Europe, stocks rose 0.75%.
Spanish bond yields rose the most in almost 2 weeks as Standard and
Poors lowered Spain’s credit rating 2 level from A to BBB+. Asian markets were down to finish the
week. Oil prices were down slightly to
104.53 while gold rose 0.36% to 1666.40.
The US dollar was mixed and 10 yr. treasury yields were flat at
1.94%. 30 yr. mortgage rates remained
low at 3.82%. The volatility index (VIX)
was slightly lower to 16.20.
