Friends
Once again, stocks were having a nice day which was made even nicer by reports that the Chinese have offered some trading concessions. Stocks added to gains on the reports and finally the S&P 500 was able to clear the 2650 resistance level. We will get a lot of earnings reports next week, but to date rather lukewarm numbers haven’t hampered the bulls’ enthusiasm. It appears, so far, that stocks were underpriced coming into earnings. But, of course we are less than a quarter of the way through earnings season so there is much work to do.
For the day, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 336 points to close at 24,706. The S&P 500 was up 34 points to finish the day at 2,670. Gold was down $11 to trade at $1,281 per ounce, while oil was up $1.73 to trade at $53.80 per barrel WTI.
The markets are closed Monday for Martin Luther King Day, but we’ll be back at it on Tuesday. We have a big lineup of earnings reports over the next two weeks. Of course, the government shutdown and China trade talks will dominate the headlines. We’ll check in with you on Tuesday.
Have a great weekend everyone.
