Dow went up 90, advancers over decliners better than 3-2 & NAZ lost 34. The MLP index crawled higher to the 183s & the REIT index rose 2+ to the 451s. Junk bond funds fluctuated & Treasuries were only slightly lower after their recent run. Oil slid back to the 74s on profit taking & gold dropped 12 to 1725.
AMJ (Alerian MLP Index tracking fund)
![Live 24 hours gold chart [Kitco Inc.]](https://www.kitco.com/images/live/gold.gif?0.2180338269244485)
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell still expects inflation to ease eventually, but said that he sees the current pressures running into 2022. Assessing the current economic situation, the Fed chief said during a panel discussion hosted by the ECB that he was “frustrated” that getting people vaccinated & arresting the spread of the Covid delta variant “remains the most important economic policy that we have.” “It’s also frustrating to see the bottlenecks and supply chain problems not getting better — in fact at the margins apparently getting a little bit worse,” he added. “We see that continuing into next year probably, and holding up inflation longer than we had thought.” Inflation by the Fed's preferred measure is running at its hottest pace in about 30 years. Powell & most of his colleagues say they expect the current pressures to decline back to trend as supply chain bottlenecks ease & demand goes back to pre-pandemic levels. He added that 2022 should be “quite a strong year” for economic growth. However, officials as of late have acknowledged that the current inflation conditions have not eased the way the Fed thought they would. The FOMC last week collectively raised its projection for 2021 core inflation to 3.7% from the 3% forecast in Jun. “The current inflation spike is really a consequence of supply constraints meeting very strong demand, and that is all associated with the reopening of the economy, which is a process that will have a beginning, a middle and an end,” Powell said. “We see those things resolving,” he added. “It’s very difficult to say how big those effects will be in the meantime or how long they will last.” Powell's continued expectations that inflation is temporary were echoed by ECB Pres Christine Lagarde, who sat on the panel with Powell, Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey & Bank of Japan Governor Haruhiko Kuroda. “We monitor very carefully, but we certainly have no reason to believe that these price increases we are seeing now will not be largely transitory going forward,” Lagarde said.
Fed Chair Powell calls inflation ‘frustrating’ and sees it running into next year
Walmart
(WMT), a Dow stock & Dividend Aristocrat, is planning to hiret 150K new US store workers, most
of them permanent & full-time, in preparation for the busy holiday
season. The retailer also said it would offer extra hours to many of its store workers. Retailers
have been offering pay raises & other incentives to retain staff to
ensure they have enough workers during the holiday shopping season,
which starts a day after Thanksgiving & continues into early Jan. The company has implemented 3 wage increases this year, with its US average
hourly wage now at $16.40. It also offers other benefits such as no-cost
college tuition, similar to many of its rivals. The stock lost 9¢.
If you would like to learn more about WMT, click on this link:
club.ino.com/trend/analysis/stock/WMT?a_aid=CD3289&a_bid=6ae5b6f7
Dr. Gottlieb: Pfizer Covid vaccine approval for young kids by Halloween possible
Dr Scott Gottlieb said it is still possible the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) will approve Pfizer & BioNTwxh's (BNTX) Covid-19 vaccine for young kids by Halloween. “I wouldn’t foreclose the possibility that this could be out in October,” said Gottlieb. PFE submitted initial Covid vaccine trial data for kids ages 5-11 to the FDA yesterday, & the company should file a formal application needed for emergency use authorization “shortly,” Gottlieb said. The FDA has a lot of experience with the PFE vaccine, Gottlieb noted, adding the Covid shot for young kids is the same 2-dose regimen as adults but is administered in smaller quantities. The agency has already cleared the shots for Americans age 12 & up. “They’ve seen a lot of clinical data,” he added. “I’ve long said October is a possibility but it is an optimistic possibility. If it slips, it could slip to mid-November.”
Dr. Gottlieb: Pfizer Covid vaccine approval for young kids by Halloween possible
Gold futures declined for a 2nd session in a row, with a climb in the $ index to its highest levels in a year sending prices for the precious metal to their lowest finish since late Mar. Dec gold lost $14 (0.8%) to settle at $1722 an ounce, following a 0.8% decline yesterday. Prices marked the lowest most-active contract settlement since Mar 31. The popular ICE U.S. Dollar Index was up 0.6% for the day, & the index is up 1.1% so far this week & 2.1% over the past qtr, pressuring prices for the precious metals. Trading in gold also came as global equity markets attempted to rebound from a selloff that saw the S&P 500 register its worst percentage fall since May 12.
Gold futures fall to their lowest settlement in about 6 months
Oil futures ended lower in volatile trading, as official gov data showed that US crude inventories climbed for the first time in 8 weeks & an index for the $ strengthened to highest level in about a year. Nov West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude fell 46¢ (0.6%) to settle at $74.83 a barrel, following a modest loss of 0.2% yesterday. Nov Brent crude, the global benchmark, declined by 45¢ (0.6%) to $78.64 a barrel, ahead of its expiration at the end of tomorrow's trading session. The most active Dec Brent contract fell 26¢ to $78.09. Prices for both WTI & Brent crude settled Mon at highs not seen for a front-month contract since Oct 2018. The EIA reported that US crude inventories rose by 4.6M barrels last week. That defied expectations for an average decline of 4.5M barrels expected. The American Petroleum Institute yesterday reported a 4.1M-barrel increase, according to sources. The weekly increase for crude inventories reported by the EIA followed 7 consecutive weeks of declines. Crude stocks at the Cushing, Okla, storage hub, meanwhile, edged up by 200K barrels for the week & total US petroleum production also rose by 500K barrels to 11.1M barrels per day. Still, at 418M barrels, US crude oil inventories are about 7% below the 5 year average for this time of year, according to the EIA.
Oil prices end lower as U.S. crude supplies mark first increase in 8 weeks
Buyers kept prices higher until the last ½ hour of trading when selling dragged down the averages. Dark clouds for investors have not gone away & the most worrisome now are the ones over DC. The goings on there are all political which makes it impossible to figure out what is going on. Fri is the new year for federal spending & there is NO budget. Then there is the nagging problem of the raising the debt ceiling. Meanwhile Dems can't figure out how to move forward on their monster spending programs which threaten future inflation. After selling in the first ½ hour of trading, the Dow finished at the low end the day's trading zone at up less than 100. Many traders are nervous with what's going on (or not going on) in DC.
Dow Jones Industrials
No comments:
Post a Comment