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Dow Jones/Nasdaq!

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Earnings are expected this week from: IMB, 3M, Intel, Ford, J&J, Merrill Lynch, GM, Coke-Cola, Merk, Microsoft, Google, eBay, Honeywell, Catepillar, Wachovia, Yahoo, AT&T, Altria, and Bank of America.

Fed Chairman speaks this week before the House Finance Committee on his semiannual report regarding monetary policy making. Look for analysts’ reviews on Thursday as to the interpretation of his Fed speaking comments.

Housing starts numbers will also come out this week. Look for numbers in the new houses started and for future orders on the books from the Commerce Department.

Levels of foreign investment in the U.S. rose in May to the tune of over $60 billion, mainly in Treasury notes. With the rise in interest rates, our currency is attractive, especially with a weak dollar still around versus the Euro, Pound, and Asian dollars.
 
Half the companies in the Standard & Poor's 500 have reported for the last quarter, with a majority coming in better than expected. S&P currently projects profits for the quarter will grow 10.5 percent, higher than initial forecasts.


The Federal Reserve has raised the fed funds target rate nine times since June 2004 to 3.25 percent from a four-decade low of 1 percent The Standard & Poor's 500 index has gained more than 8 percent since the Fed started to rise interest rates a little more than a year ago.


Economic data reports this week include existing home sales on Monday, consumer confidence on Tuesday, and durable goods orders and new home sales on Wednesday.


Investors also will look to the Fed's report on regional economic conditions, known as the Beige Book, on Wednesday.


Rounding out the data menu will be two more reports on Friday: the University of Michigan's final reading for July consumer sentiment and the Chicago Purchasing Managers' Index, a gauge of business activity in the U.S. Midwest.


This Friday (7/29), the government is likely to report the U.S. economy expanded at a 3.4 percent annual rate in the three months ending June 30, compared with growth of 3.8 percent in the first quarter, according to a Reuters poll of economists
 
The U.S. House of Representatives pushed through an energy bill with tax-credits of $14.6 billion. Credits will be given to oil, gas, electricity and renewable energy companies. The Senate is voting on this bill on Friday. Consumers get a $2,000 tax credit if they purchased a hybrid car in 2005; since most are over-priced this may take some of the sting out of the sticker price.

Is there $$$ waiting for you?

There is an estimated $23 billion in unclaimed money in the U.S. Sometimes it is an old deposit from a utility company, unclaimed stock dividends, paychecks, or insurance policies. By law companies must return these “forgotten” assets to the state treasury for safekeeping. Check out these websites to help out your quest: www.unclaimed.org, www.missingmoney.com. Do not ever pay out money or a fee to get your unclaimed funds, just look online or call your state treasurer.

Customer service is still a lost art to many companies. Experts suggest the following to any companies getting more than 1% complaints: 1. understand your customer 2. treat customers like you would want to be treated 3. be truthful, never mislead a customer 4. extend courteous service to all 5.make-up for a mistake by great effort and sincere apology, never take the customer for granted, they vote with their dollars.
 
Why are the indexes flat this year?

Why are the indexes flat this year, well personal savings is way down! In a report by the Commerce Department consumer spending was up 0.8% in June and SAVINGS were at 0%, that’s right ZERO. This is the lowest since 9/11 and the second lowest since the Depression! The consumer spending is making an impact at the quarterly earnings reports but not at the indexes. This is why the study of economics is such a tricky, double-edged sword kind of science. Just when you think things are good, in some areas they’re not. Now the question is “where will the indexes go” the next six months? Time will tell.

ANY COMMENTS??????
 
AP
Floridians Lose Millions in Hedge Fund
Saturday August 13, 7:33 pm ET
Dozens of Wealthy Floridians Lose $160 Million in Alleged Investment Con, Investigators Say

MIAMI (AP) -- Dozens of wealthy investors were scammed out of $160 million by three self-proclaimed hedge fund operators who set up flashy offices in Palm Beach County, took their money and ran, federal investigators said.

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Now, months after authorities became suspicious, two of the three partners have fled the country, and the third isn't answering questions from investigators.

Most of KL Financial's 200 clients were men of retirement age. Gary Klein, a lawyer representing dozens of them, told The Miami Herald that he has clients who lost everything.

The SEC has filed a formal complaint accusing KL Financial of misrepresenting the fund's performance and possibly misappropriating money. A federal court has frozen the company's assets.

Mike Tein, one of KL's court-appointed receivers, said the three men directly received $20 million during their six-year reign at KL, spending lavishly on million-dollar homes, exotic sports cars and frequent trips to Las Vegas.

Within 24 hours of a surprise visit to a KL Financial office in California in February by SEC investigators, Won Lee, 34, reportedly cashed in frequent-flier miles for a one-way ticket to South Korea. Investigators have not heard from him since.

Another partner, Yung Kim, 34, vanished a day later, but answered a surprised investigator's cell phone call weeks later. The line went dead after Yung was asked where he was, and authorities haven't heard from him since, Tein said.

Chief trader John Kim, 36, remains in Florida and has promised to cooperate with investigators. But during a March 11 deposition, John Kim asserted his Fifth Amendment right to avoid self-incrimination to each of 195 questions.

His attorney, Gregory C. Ward, said in a March 16 motion that Lee and Yung Kim were to blame for losing the firm's money "without John Kim's knowledge or participation."
 
What`s up this week?

Among the economic reports scheduled for the week ahead are August producer prices on Tuesday, August retail sales on Wednesday and consumer prices and the Philadelphia Fed survey on Thursday. Market watchers expect most of the data will consist of information gathered before Hurricane Katrina, which will show how well the economy was doing when the storm hit.

But the data could determine whether the Fed might take a break from raising interest rates. Rate hikes are considered a negative for stocks as they increase borrowing costs for companies and consumers. The next meeting of the central bank's policy-setting committee is scheduled for Sept. 20. Policy makers have raised the benchmark lending rate 10 times since June 2004 to 3.5 percent.

Economists polled by Reuters estimated that the CPI rose 0.6 percent in August, with a 0.2 percent rise in the core index, which excludes food and energy prices.

Last week, the Dow ended up 2.2 percent, its biggest gain in nearly 4 months. The Standard & Poor's 500 ended the week 1.9 percent higher, and Nasdaq advanced 1.6 percent.
 
Yesterday the markets traded in the mixed category in the early afternoon hours as news from Alcoa and IBM regarding earnings sent the blue chips up slightly while the Nasdaq remained in the red. Look out later this week, as the third quarter earnings reports will start to appear.

A group of economists (52) are forecasting the GDP for 2006 at 3.3%. Part of the increase is as a result of the hurricane season this year as new infrastructure, housing, and businesses will be spending a lot of money to repair the effected Gulf States.

Look out for more Federal Reserve speeches scheduled this week as analysts speculate that the run-up in gas prices and spending in the Gulf States are pushing the economy upward and hence a need to step on the gas; meaning interest rate hikes to continue.
 
The DOW broke even today and the NASDAQ rose 0.5%

Will this be enough to spur our markets into the green after 5 fairly flat days?

I think it will even though it is October (not by much though).

Look forward to a positive Monday if the DOW consolidates tonight.
 

Your right Dutchie,
I forgot about the CPI data that came in today. It looks good but not on the supposed expectations of 0,9 %. She is only on 0,1 %. Retail sales are up and thats good. Monday looks bullish.
Cheers,
EX
 
The appointment of Bernanke to succeed Greenspan as head of FRB appears to be a positive sign to analysts.

DOW and Nasdaq down overnight following good up day yesterday.

(I think the performance of DOW is trying to tell us something).

Early opening prices on ASX appear green - whats up ?? - haven't they seen the DOW yet, Baaa Baaa.
 
I am a margin trader, I trade on the ASX, I did have a portfolio of US stocks that I traded for 2 yrs which included Dow and Nasdaq stocks, I traded through Ameritrade (used to be Datek). I liquidated and cashed out and took advantage of favourable exchange rates at the time and in hindsight was a good time to do it as the US markets have slid sideways since.

Anyone who is invested in shares has obviously got to take a view on what is happening in America - even if you just hold Australian stocks.

Let's start with a macro view and the issues of the moment. Inflation, inflation, inflation seems to be all anyone is talking about - how high oil prices are producing this knock on effect and how much of an influence this is going to have on company earnings and consumer habits which are interelated.

Global growth seems like it will chug along at a pedestrian level at least for the next 12months. China keeps growing and sucking a lot of resources from our diversified miners and predictions are that this will continue indefinitely.

One thing I am concerned about is the warped size of the US current account deficit and how much of an imbalance this is in proportion to the rest of the world. I know that deficits exist in many business structures and can be carried for many yrs - but the USA seems a little too high and sooner or later this has to be looked at.

But many US companies are cashed up with strong balance sheets and are leveraged at quite a low rate so this is a positive sign.

I will be an interesting 12 months to follow.

Some of the stocks I have traded on the US markets include:

C, UNM, JPM, PAYX, SUNW, HPQ, LLTC, DUK, AYE, SGP, GE, BMY and BIOMET
 
dutchie said:
The appointment of Bernanke to succeed Greenspan as head of FRB appears to be a positive sign to analysts.
Click to expand...

I heard comments in a TV interview (Newshour with Jim Lehrer) that he is supposed to be more collaborative with his colleagues than Greenspan and that he has the academic credentials for the job (unlike some Bush cronies who get there because of some dodgy lobby group).
 
With the dow up by 173 points on friday, monday will reverse last weeks losses....man what a ride we had in October...I am sea sick and the short sellers better cover their position because if this carries on we are in for the X mas rally.......LOLOLOLO
 
Just read some interesting comments on H/C. I dont understand charts but saying something about a diamond pattern and that the dow will probably fall. Views on the dow and its impact for the end of the year?
 

One swallow does not a summer make.

The 176 pt rise in context:
 

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It appears that to some degree people are really unsure of the markets direction so things are very volatile would love to see some stability soon.
 
September and October have always been terribile months in the history of stock markets. Probably because of certain events that have occured during this period: this uncertainty brings havoc on the market and all of a sudden nobody really knows what their investments are really worth.
Now that we are entering November, it would be advisable to update our startegies and to take advantage of the bearish market to BUY.
I think the next months to come are loaded with surprises. I`m happy that Bernanke is coming. New news is not always bad news...
 
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