The Week In Review
2nd quarter
July 2, 2010U.S. stocks opened modestly higher on Friday following a luke warm monthly jobs report which produced 83,000 jobs, but less than expected. The bottom line, the recovery is progressing but it seems to be very slow. Rising after six consecutive down days, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 35 points to 9,767. The S&P 500 added 4 points to 1,031. The Nasdaq Composite jumped 7 points to 2,108. Nothing looks particularly good this morning. A quiet day for news as well as many investors will leave early for the holiday weekend. Apple is modestly higher after admitting they or AT&T had screwed up the signal strength. Coventry Health is upping guidance for the second quarter even as they take a charge for legal fees. Google is modestly higher after getting clobbered the last several days after announcing an acquisition. Freeport McMoRan is up 2% after hitting a new recent low yesterday. Brutal market. Exxon Mobil was upgraded, but the stock is modestly lower. At 10 o'clock, a bad factory number sent the averages into the red. After the first hour the averages were back in the green, but only in single digits. The best we can expect today is an unchanged market. Following the first hour the averages were back in the red. Very few stocks are in the green. Through the morning and into the afternoon the averages remained in the red, falling as much as 100 points before recovering. In the last hour, some short covering brought the averages all the way back. The Dow rose as much as 20 points only to fall once again into the close. The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished down 46 points at 9,686. with all but four components ending lower. The S&P 500 fell 4 points to 1,022. The Nasdaq Composite fell 9 points to 2,091. For the week, the Dow lost 4.51%, the S&P 500 fell 5%, and the Nasdaq Composite sank 5.92%.
Second Quarter
U.S. stocks slumped on Wednesday, leading the market to its worst quarter since December 2008. It was an ugly quarter. The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished the quarter down 96 points, or 1%, to 9,774. The S&P 500 index fell 10 points, or 1%, to 1,030, while the Nasdaq Composite fell 25 points, or 1.2%, to 2,109. For June, the Dow Industrials fell 3.6%, the S&P 500 fell 5.4% and the Nasdaq dropped 6.6%. For the second quarter, the Dow lost 10%, marking its first drop after four straight quarters of growth. The S&P 500 fell 11.9% and the Nasdaq slumped 12% during the quarter, with these two indexes posting their worst quarter since December 2008. For the year, the Dow is now down 6.2%, the S&P 500 is down 7.6%, and the Nasdaq is down 7%. Let's hope the second half brings better results.