So much for the usual Black Friday hype. On Monday – the first full trading day after the Thanksgiving holiday – the NYSE Composite (^NYA) lost 67 points on news that Black Friday holiday sales decreased by 11%. The post-holiday punch didn’t affect all stocks, however. Among those to buck the downward move, Buenaventura Mining…
Once again the internals of the market (advancers vs decliners, new highs vs new lows and trends) triggered a Hindenburg Omen as today’s dump-and-pump on the European close and Draghi ‘mis-characterization and clarification’ headlines left stock green with an hour to go. Then came headlines from Die Welt that appeared to show Draghi has no…
When I was in junior high, my friend Scott had this Billy Crystal tape that we passed back and forth to each other. I still like Billy Crystal, but let’s just say he was truly hilarious when I was 13 back in 1987. He had this routine about old codgers who used to tell you…
“The enormous gap between what US leaders do in the world and what Americans think their leaders are doing is one of the great propaganda accomplishments of the dominant political mythology.” Michael Parenti “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who murders its prophets, and stones those sent to preserve her. How often I have wished to gather your children with…
In the great fiscal scheme of things, October 22, 1981 seems like only yesterday. That’s the day the US public debt crossed the $1 trillion mark for the first time. It had taken the nation 74,984 days to get there (205 years). What prompts this reflection is that just a few days ago the national debt breached…
Written by Gary Markets made a sudden spike upward at 12:30 pushing the DOW and SP500 to new historic highs on news of reports that the European Central Bank could be preparing a new stimulus package for its meeting next month. By 4 pm the markets closed in the red with the large caps flat and…
“But now, in this century of ideologies, the Gods and Destiny have been given new life. ‘Miracles in the world are many,’ Sophocles wrote in the fifth century BC. ‘There is no greater miracle than man.’ Suddenly, at the end of the twentieth century, we discover that no, after all, it isn’t true. Historical inevitability…
Blue Line 4 Week Average The market was expecting the weekly initial unemployment claims at 290,000 to 300,000 (consensus 295,000) vs the 297,000 reported. The more important (because of the volatility in the weekly reported claims and seasonality errors in adjusting the data) 4 week moving average moved from 294,250 (reported last week as 294,000) to…
Aeropostale, Inc.’s (ARO – Snapshot Report) third-quarter fiscal 2014 adjusted loss came in at 45 cents per share, in line with the Zacks Consensus Estimate. However, the loss was much wider than the prior-year quarter’s loss per share of 29 cents and hence dragged the shares down 9.7% during after-market trading hours yesterday. Today the…
