(As of 7:20 am PST)
Stocks are adding to gains
from yesterday as investors are shrugging off today’s jobless numbers to focus
on earnings and surprising data out of China.
Jobless claims were not a big deal to investors, with claims rising
4,000 last week to 371,000. We’re in an
earnings dominated week, which generally shrugs off these types of
reports. Companies of note reporting
today include Nokia, which released strong preliminary results, and
grocery-chain Supervalu, which beat analyst’s estimates. Good news out of
Europe showed signs that the recession is not worsening. The dominant story of the day came out of
China as Chinese exports rose 14.1% year-over-year in December. These numbers blew analysts estimates out of
the water and helped widen China’s trade surplus to $31.9 billion. Many analysts question if the surge will
continue into the new year, noting year-over-year trade data can be
volatile. However, the surprise increase
was enough to lift global stocks and commodities. Gold and oil are up nearly 1% and interest
rates are higher. It doesn’t appear that
the ‘risk trade’ is on, however if positive earnings continue to come in today,
we expect these gains to hold.
