Up down, up down. Red green, red green. that’s what the market has been doing. I checked my funds awhile ago and I have to admit that though I’m down about 8.7% in my China equities, I’m not too concerned. Busy but good week here. Have a good weekend folks in case I don’t make it to post another entry.

Quoted from http://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/article/minute-rally-tips-wall-street-green_405657_2.html:

Last Minute Rally Tips Wall Street Green

Thursday, Dec. 13 2007

Uptick

Last Minute Rally Tips Wall Street Green

Matt Egan FOXBusiness Articles Comtex SmarTrend(R) Morning Call — November 28, 2007 Comtex SmarTrend(R) Morning Call — December 13, 2007 TheMarkets.com Launches Enhanced Version of Broker Voting Platform, MeritMark Comtex SmarTrend(R) Morning Call — November 16, 2007 Comtex SmarTrend(R) Morning Call — November 14, 2007
NEW YORK — After trading in the red for nearly the entire day, Wall Street turned mostly green just before the closing bell, led by big gains from several key industrial giants and the financial sector paring its losses.

Today’s Markets

The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 44.06 points, or 0.33% to 13517.96, the Standard & Poor’s 500 index picked up 1.82 points, or 0.12% to 1488.41 and the Nasdaq Composite Index fell 2.65, or 0.10%, to 2668.49. The consumer-friendly Fox 50 rose 2.57, or 0.24%, to 1077.31.

Big losses in the financial sector earlier today were offset by industrial giants Honeywell (HON: 60.65, +2.91, +5.03%) and Boeing (BA: 88.55, +1.63, +1.87%), as traders focused in on positive economic numbers and Lehman Brothers (LEH: 61.37, -0.45, -0.72%) beating the street.

Honeywell jumped 5% after it backed its 2008 outlook of a 5% to 7% rise in sales. It also said it sees earnings per share for the year will rise up to 21% to between $3.65 and $3.80 a share. The high end of that range would beat current mean estimates from Thomson Financial.

Boeing rose almost 2% after the company said it is set to begin assembly of its first 777 Freighter in the beginning of 2008. Boeing announced a $4.5 billion purchase from GE Commercial Aviation Services to build 55 jetliners.

Wall Street also got a boost after the Commerce Department said retail sales rose by 1.2% in November, the biggest increase in six months. That represents twice the gain that economists had been forecasting.

Late in the day big banks like Citigroup (C: 31.01, -0.46, -1.46%) and JP Morgan Chase (JPM: 45.76, -0.39, -0.84%) pared their losses and came off of session lows.

Traders may have taken away some positives from Lehman Brothers (LEH: 61.37, -0.45, -0.72%) earnings, which beat Wall Street expectations.

Still, in recent days nervousness about the financial sectorhas hurt shares of banks and brought volatility back to Wall Street.

Moves this week by the Fed to cut two key interest rates by 0.25% and create a new vehicle to auction off loans seem to have done little to ease trader uneasiness about the financial sector.

“That’s still a shadow over the market. We just don’t want to have this combination of a (weak) real estate market and liquidity crisis turn into a recession area,” said Frank Davis, director of sales and trading at Lek Securities.

A Bank of America (BAC: 43.05, -0.38, -0.87%) analyst told investors to downgraded Washington Mutual (WM: 15.59, -0.47, -2.92%) to “sell” this morning. Shares of WaMu fell to their lowest level since March 2000.

Meanwhile, news from the Labor Department could indicate that the Fed may be less likely to cut interest rates at its next meeting.

Wholesale prices shot up 3.2% in November, the biggest monthly gain since August 1973. Record energy prices were the main catalyst for the increase in producer-related inflation.

“I think retail sales kind of outweighed that today,” said Davis.

If the Fed feels that inflation has risen too quickly it could decide to hold interest rates rather than risk fueling a sharp price increase with cheaper money.

Big losses from Biogen (BIIB: 57.91, -17.97, -23.68%) helped keep the Nasdaq Composite out of the green. The stock fell 24% after it announced yesterday it won’t be seeking a sale of its company. The biotech company had been in a two-month process to see which direction it would go in.

Oil prices retreated after yesterday’s $4 surge. In New York oil fell $2.14 to settle at $92.25 a barrel.

Corporate Movers

Citigroup (C: 31.01, -0.46, -1.46%) chief operating officer Robert Druskin is retiring, according to Dow Jones Newswires.

Lehman Brothers (LEH: 61.37, -0.45, -0.72%) beat analysts expectations and didn’t drop any bombshells in its quarterly report this morning. Lehman said it earned $886 million, or $1.54 a share, from $1 billion, or $1.72 a share, a year earlier. Shares of Lehman were still trading lower on a 60% drop in the firm’s Fixed Income unit.

Morgan Stanley (MS: 50.20, -0.17, -0.33%) is in store for a shake-up in the near future, according to the Wall Street Journal. The company is expected to name Richard Portogallo and Jerome Wood as new co-heads of Clients and Services, the Journal reported, citing people familiar with the situation.

JetBlue Airways (JBLU: 7.15, +0.90, +14.40%) surged 13% after a New York Times report said Deutsche Lufthansa was in talks to buy a stake in the company. This afternoon Lufthansa confirmed it will buy a 19% stake in the airliner, according to Dow Jones Newswires.

Motorola (MOT: 16.22, +0.03, +0.18%) finished slightly higher after a Wall Street Journal article suggested the electronics company is thinking about breaking up some of its units. Investor Carl Icahn has advocated for such a move, arguing that the stock would be worth 50% more than its current value.

Costco (COST: 68.54, -1.65, -2.35%) met market expectations reporting earnings of 59 cents a share, representing an 11% rise in net income from a year ago. Shares of the retail giant fell as its sales were slightly lower than expected.

Dow Chemical (DOW: 44.39, +2.64, +6.32%) closed 6% higher after it unveiled a 50/50 joint venture with a division of Kuwait Petroleum to create a new petrochemicals company.

Dow Jones (DJ: 59.98, +0.01, +0.01%) shareholders have given final approval to the $5 billion sale of the company to News Corp. (NWS: 21.44, -0.21, -0.96%), according to the Wall Street Journal. Dow Jones is the publisher of the Journal and News Corp. is the parent company of FOX Business.

XM Satellite Radio (XMSR: 13.99, +0.78, +5.90%) and Sirius Satellite Radio (SIRI: 3.41, +0.12, +3.64%) continued to bounce around as investors are anxious ahead of an expected FCC decision on the two company’s proposed merger. A Stifel, Nicolaus analyst this morning said he doesn’t expect a Congressional letter opposing the move will have an impact. The merger still has to get approval from the Department of Justice’s anti-trust unit.

World Markets

The Dow Jones Euro Stoxx 50 index, a 50-member market capitalization index of some of top European companies, fell 98.71 or 2.21%, to 4370.76. The FTSE 100, the primary index for the London Stock Exchange, dropped 195.60 points, or 2.98%, to 6364.20.

France’s CAC 40 index fell 152.41 or 2.65%, to 5590.91 and Germany’s DAX fell 147.81, or 1.83%, to 7928.31.

In Asian markets, Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 fell 395.74 points, or 2.48%, to 15536.52. The Hang Seng Index, the benchmark for the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, plunged 776.61, or 2.72%, to 27744.45.

Data Dump

Initial jobless claims dropped by 7,000 to 333,000 last week, in line with expectations.
Continuing unemployment claims increased by 38,000 for the week ending Dec. 1.

While initial jobless claim for the sixth time over the past eight weeks, the moving average for the quarter-to-date is nearing the highest in two years.

Tags FOX Business,Wall Street,Dow Jones,HGIF China A

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