Written by Gary
The major us stock market indexes closed mostly in the green (SPY +0.8%) Expectations for at least a near-term stock-market correction once Trump becomes the presidential are running high. A number of analysts and commentators have written about the potential fulfillment of the old market axiom: “buy the rumor, sell the news.”
Todays S&P 500 Chart
The Market in Perspective
| Here are the headlines moving the markets. | |
 | S&P 500 gains as bank earnings start strongNEW YORK (Reuters) – The S&P 500 rose on Friday after major U.S. banks kicked off the fourth-quarter earnings season with strong results, making investors more confident about heady valuations after a recent market rally, while the Nasdaq closed at a record. |
| Top U.S. bank executives optimistic heading into 2017NEW YORK (Reuters) – Executives of big U.S. banks expressed optimism on Friday about the outlook for 2017 in their first public comments about quarterly earnings since the U.S. presidential election in November. |
| EU, U.S. strike deal to boost transatlantic insurance marketBRUSSELS (Reuters) – The European Union and the United States agreed on Friday to reduce legal and capital barriers to boost the $3 billion transatlantic insurance and reinsurance market. |
| Trump adviser: TPP ‘dead,’ will move quickly on bilateral trade dealsWASHINGTON (Reuters) – President-elect Donald Trump will not revive his predecessor’s stalled Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal in any form, but will quickly pursue bilateral trade agreements, a Trump transition policy adviser said. |
| Lockheed Martin CEO meets Trump, says deal to lower F-35 costs is closeNEW YORK (Reuters) – Lockheed Martin Corp is close to a deal to significantly lower the cost of its F-35 aircraft, Chief Executive Officer Marillyn Hewson said on Friday after meeting with U.S. President-elect Donald Trump. |
| Takata to plead guilty, pay $1 billion U.S. penalty over air bag defectsDETROIT/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Japan’s Takata Corp on Friday agreed to plead guilty to criminal wrongdoing and pay $1 billion to resolve a U.S. Justice Department investigation into ruptures of its air bag inflators linked to at least 16 deaths worldwide. |
| Airbus versus Boeing: Iran deals the difference in plane battlePARIS (Reuters) – Over the past two decades, planemakers Airbus and Boeing have traded the crown in the annual orders race, and it was usually clear who had bragging rights in the fiercely competitive $120 billion annual jet market. |
| Exclusive: Pratt’s F135 engine chief, other employees leave after ethics issue – sourcesBERLIN (Reuters) – Ten employees of United Technologies Corp’s Pratt & Whitney unit, including the head of its F135 engine program, have left the company after an internal audit uncovered an ethics issue linked to a visit by a South Korean delegation, sources familiar with the matter told Reuters. |
| SpaceX 2015 accident cost it hundreds of millions: Wall St. JournalCAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Reuters) – – Elon Musk’s SpaceX lost more than a quarter of a billion dollars in 2015 after a botched cargo run to the International Space Station and the subsequent grounding of its Falcon 9 rocket fleet, The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday. |
| Expect Test of 2200 over Next Two Weeks (Video)By EconMatters We discuss the two obvious markets bubbles in the FTSE and Nasdaq, and do some general market commentary in this video. Amazon and Facebook are going to get slaughtered from these levels on earning`s reports. EconMatters All Rights Reserved | Facebook | Twitter | YouTube | |
| Mainstream Media Meltdown: ‘Journalists’ Seek ‘Safe Space’ To Discuss “How To Cover Trump”After the president-elect’s first press conference since the election this week, it appears the mainstream media is in need of a ‘safe space’. As The Hill reports, so-called journalists from the Huffington Post, Slate, CNN, and Univision will gather days before Donald Trump’s inauguration to publicly discuss “how the news media can and should proceed to cover” the president-elect. After this happened…
Source: Branco Slate will host the event next Wednesday, called “Not the New Normal.” CNN’s Brian Stelter will moderate the panel at New York University. As The Hill details,
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| House Passes Budget Resolution Clearing Path For Obamacare RepealAfter a tweet from the President-elect this morning promising that “The “Unaffordable” Care Act will soon be history!”, the House of Representatives has just approved a budget resolution that brings that promise one step closer to its fruition. Although many speculated that House Republicans would splinter after weeks of bickering on the merits of a simultaneous repeal and replace versus repeal now and replace later strategy, the final vote came in at 227-198 with only 9 Republicans dissenting.
And here is the full official vote tally courtesy of CSPAN:
Of course, the House vote comes just one day after the Senate voted 51-48 to approve the budget resolution with Rand Paul being the only dissenting Republican vote. Here’s our summary from yesterday:
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| Consumers Confident but Not Enough to SpendAmericans say they’re feeling more upbeat about the economy. Retailers will be forgiven if they don’t quite believe that. Retail sales rose 0.6% in December, a result that fell slightly short of economists’ forecasts. |
| EPA Action Highlights Fiat’s Financial WeaknessIt’s still early in Fiat Chrysler’s regulatory drama, but it looks like the company is in a better position versus the regulators than Volkswagen. It’s the company’s finances that make it vulnerable. |
| Nintendo May Not Know How the Game Is PlayedUser base is crucial is crucial in videogames. If Nintendo wants its new Switch system to break the Playstation-Xbox duopoly, it needs to switch its pricing strategy. |
| The private-investment firm that is opening its books to the publicFundersClub, an online investing platform, is pulling back the curtain on the often closelipped world of private company investing. |
| Market Extra: ‘Bearish divergence’ warns it isn’t safe to buy bank stocksShares of J.P. Morgan Chase and Bank of America hit significant highs despite downtrends in a key momentum indicator, warning investors that it may not be safe to keep buying. |
| Market Extra: Which U.S. markets are closed on Martin Luther King Jr. Day?All U.S. financial markets will close Monday to commemorate Martin Luther King Jr. Day, giving investors time to regroup ahead of fourth-quarter earnings seasons which is expected to pick up pace after the holiday. |
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