Morning Briefing
Congress moves close to $470 billon deal with $310 billion for small business
The Senate could vote as early as 4 p.m. today to approve  $470 billion coronavirus rescue bill that includes $310 billion to replenish the small business forgivable loan program. The House would take up the deal on Thursday but need unanimous consent to move the bill...
Oil plunges on futures market on panic over expiring May futures contract
Warning: This is going to be a little "insider baseball. As of 1:30 p.m. the quoted price on Bloomberg of U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate was 80.02% to $3.65 a barrel. On the other hand, international benchmark Brent crude was down"just" 5.80% to $26.45 a...
China GDP plunges by 6.8% in first quarter
China's gross domestic product contracted by 6.8% from a year ago in the first quarter. Economists had projected a 6.0% drop. The decline was the worst since the government began releasing quarterly GDP numbers in 1992. Other numbers in today's data dump were equally...
Job losses top 22 million as week sees another 5.2 million initial claims for unemployment
5.245 million more people filed initial claims for unemployment in the week ended April 11, the Labor Department reported this morning. That was down from the prior week's 6.615 million (revised upwards from an initial report of 6.606 million.) Â But it still brings...
What do you do when the market is insane and you’re not?
In the short run rationality is not an especially adaptive trait for an investor. Remember that. Take today's market for example. JPMorgan Chase (JPM) and Wells Fargo (WFC) delivered very sobering news on how the coronavirus and the coronavirus shutdown of big hunks...
Oil deal gets a shrug from the oil markets
This take from Goldman Sachs pretty much sums up the oil market's reaction to Sunday's agreement among OPEC+, the United States, Canada, Brazil, and various and sundry G20 oil producers to cut what could be generously calculated as 14.7 million barrels a day from the...
The deluge of cuts to earnings estimates has started–but Wall Street remains optimistic–perhaps too optimistic–on Q1 estimates
I opened my online brokerage account yesterday to see an endless stream of news briefs about Wall Street analyst cuts to earnings estimates for the first quarter earnings season that begins next week with earnings from JPMorgan Chase (JPM) and Wells Fargo (WFC) on...
Economy shed another 6.6 million jobs last week
Just too much potentially market-moving news this morning. I count three stories in that category and it's only noon. But let's begin. 6.61 million Americans filed initial claims for unemployment in the week ended April 4, the Labor Department reported this morning....
Stocks rally on Trump, Fauci optimism on coronavirus
Last night President Donald Trump told Sean Hannity on his Fox News show that his administration is planning to "reopen" the U.S. economy.  “We’re looking at the concept where we open sections of the country and we’re also looking at the concept where you open up...
Watch out for a wild Thursday (and maybe even Wednesday)
The U.S. stock markets are closed on Friday, April 10, for Good Friday. That sets up a short week and a long weekend--which would be likely to produce higher than normal volume and volatility on Thursday anyway as traders and investors bought and sold to position...
Market rallies big this morning on lower new infection rates in Italy, Spain
A rally in European stocks that took the  STOXX 600 index up 3% in morning trading has extended to New York. At noon New York Time today, the Standard & Poor's 500 was up 5.65% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average was ahead 5.66%. The NASDAQ Composite had gained...Jim’s Stock Alerts
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