Australian business confidence has increased by record levels over the quarter, according to the Sensis Business Index released today. Business confidence has almost doubled during the quarter, with the indicator up 18 percentage points to 30%. It now sits slightly below the levels recorded 12 months ago. (The survey was conducted from May 6 to […]

The bears are having their overdue picnic but it’s no feast with volume only light. We are in the pullback phase and after markets have risen so strongly since early March, this had to be expected. The question is how deep will it fall? The Dow fell 107 points or 1.2% to 8,504. The Nasdaq […]

 Wall Street players had nothing to really spook them nor excite them and the market went nowhere, but in keeping with the current consensus of thinking, it fell, slightly. Story hunters focused on Obama’s planned financial system regulations and some ‘smart’ analyst thought investors were afraid that the new rules would hit bank profits. Well, […]

China excited Wall Street and it coped with GM filing for bankruptcy with those so-called green shoots starting to resemble small leaves. The Dow rose 221 points or 2.6% to 8,721.   The Nasdaq jumped 54 points or 3% to 1,828. The S&P 500 stormed 23 points higher to 942, leaving the important 928 level […]

Wall Street went higher and it was helped by a bigger than expected rise in pending sales of existing sales. In fact, it was the biggest in — wait for it — seven and a half years. The Dow rose 19 points or 0.2% to 8,740.   The Nasdaq put on 8 points or 4% […]

Four up days on Wall Street were KO’d with falls for stocks, but it was not a convincing rejection. Commodities were weaker but they have surged recently. The Dow fell 65 points or 0.7% to 8675.   The Nasdaq lost 10 points or 0.6% to 1825.   The S&P 500 dropped 12 points or 1.4% […]

 Wall Street put on another positive day with a Goldman Sachs report saying oil is heading towards $US85 a barrel this year. They also painted a better picture for job losses for the US economy, which Goldman sees as recovering in the second-half of this year. The Dow put on 75 points or 8% to […]

A better than expected jobs report had the bond market pushing up yields as forward thinkers start worrying about inflation. Could this be possible before a recovery has actually happened? Is the market getting ahead of itself? The Dow finished up 1 point to 8,764.   The Nasdaq lost 7 points to 1,824.   The […]

Wall Street did nothing dramatic over night but for those worrying about government-dependent, big borrowing banks in the USA, 10 banks were approved to repay $68 billion worth of TARP loans. That has to be a good sign for a recovering US economy! Another green shoot popped out with Texas Instruments raising its guidance for […]

The market did not move that far but the market mover was disappointing after the 10-year Treasury auction produced a yield higher than expected of 3.99%. This worked against the positives of Home Depot raising its profit outlook. The Dow lost 24 points to 8,739. The Nasdaq slipped 7 points to 1,853. The S&P 500 […]

Wall Street defied a spike in oil prices to $US73 a barrel to register another positive close. This result was helped by more improved economic news. The Dow finished up 31 points to 8,770.   The Nasdaq was up 9 points to 1,862.   The S&P 500 rose 5 points to 944. Those 600 levels […]

Wall Street doesn’t want to sell off despite there being many reasons why it should have a pullback. And while there could be some triggers this week for many to press the sell button, there’s still a lot of cash on the sidelines looking for better returns than fixed interest. The Dow eked out a […]