Here’s what’s shaking:
Stocks:
The stock market struggled for direction Monday morning after five days of losses, with the “fiscal cliff” just hours away and lawmakers yet to reach a solution.
The Dow Jones industrial average was down slightly, 24 points, to 12,914 after the first half-hour of trading. The Standard & Poor’s 500 was up two points at 1,405. The Nasdaq composite index was up five to 2,965.
Many investors are unsure of what to do with their money as long as the “fiscal cliff” remains unsolved. That refers to higher taxes and government spending cuts that will kick in Tuesday if Republicans and Democrats can’t hammer out a budget compromise by midnight Monday. Both sides had been hoping for a deal over the weekend, but negotiations were stop and go. Both the House and Senate were scheduled to meet again Monday, unusual for New Year’s Eve.
Trading volume has also been light, with many investors still on vacation. With fewer shares trading hands, the market can be moved by relatively small trades. Last week, about 2.2 billion shares traded hands each day on average. Throughout the year, the average has been closer to 3.6 billion.
The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note rose to 1.73 percent from 1.70 percent late Friday.
Oil:
Oil prices were little changed Monday as a U.S. budget deadline neared with rival politicians still at odd over key issues.
Benchmark oil for February delivery was down 8 cents late morning London at $90.72 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract fell 7 cents to finish at $90.80 per barrel in New York on Friday.
The focus over the rest of the day will continue to focus on developments in Washington D.C. The Senate has to agree a deal by the end of Monday to avoid the so-called “fiscal cliff” of automatic tax increases and spending cuts.
In London, Brent crude, used to price various kinds of foreign oil, fell 43 cents to $110.19 a barrel on the ICE Futures exchange.
Markets:
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The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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Walkabout
Dec. 31, 2012 at 12:37pm“Pentagon To “Temporarily” Fire 800,000 If No Cliff Deal; Chaos To Ensue” -Zerohedge.
Obama about to get politically owned by events. After the 100 days of his 2nd term his start will fade to become an albatross around the neck of the Democrat party.
The press will conduct push polls to prove otherwise. But events will overtake him Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands to Syria & points in between.
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Topcat
Dec. 31, 2012 at 12:12pmI am a swing trader , and monitor the markets daily .
Today the market is moving sideways in waiting , by the time the Wall Street guys get back from lunch they will have to decide what to do . So starting at 1:00PM till the end of the trading day , if there is no deal by then there could be a major sell off coming , this afternoon . With high speed trading trading today , we could see drops to the market stops in big sell offs. We could be in for a wild ride today .
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ares338
Dec. 31, 2012 at 11:47amWhy the heII is anyone talking about a deal? This whole thing is political theater with prominate Republicans also playing lead roles. All of these corrupt politicians are so rich that falling off of a so called cliff will not hurt them one bit. Well hyuck…hyuck…hyuck…let’s elect them smart fellars agin.
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Walkabout
Dec. 31, 2012 at 2:02pmI think politicians are afraid of the media will do to them if they seem uncaring. Especially the Republicans.. Mostly the Republicans.
I think the Republicans could do just as well as by doing what Chris Christie did. Tell the other side go on with your theatrics, I am going to turn on the TV & have pizza & beer.
Just give Obama a fair offer. If he does not respond with one kick it back immediately with no comment. Let him sweat.
I just know I got to get to a better place away from blue people so I don’t subsidize their stupidity or are harmed by their ways.
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niterider
Dec. 31, 2012 at 11:19amThe stock market has not been an indicator of american productivity or wealth in a long time. It is actually working as a propaganda tool at this time. $16 + trillion in debt and the stock market over 12,000 ? Seriously ? Ask yourself: Why?
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hi
Dec. 31, 2012 at 11:28amI agree.
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Mandors
Dec. 31, 2012 at 11:59amUm, for the same reason we bailed out all those billionaires in the Hamptons?
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niterider
Dec. 31, 2012 at 12:45pmhttp://forecast-chart.com/chart-gdp-rate.html
Updated on October 5, 2012 the 2012 2nd Quarter GDP was 15.59 Trillion $$, that means our debt of $16 trillion is more than 100% of our GDP. Our politicians are arguing and dealing on less than 2% of our problem. We are Greece, Spain, Ireland plus ! Obummer will add nearly 4 trillion more debt in the next 4 years, add the possibility that he can potentially swing the Supreme Court hard left with one more appointment and you have disaster in CAPITAL letters in our very immediate future. The “fiscal cliff” is just media hype to take your attention off the real problem: the roller coaster is headed down and dramatically to the Socialist/Elitist LEFT. What we need to be fighting now is the GUN GRAB from Diane Feinstein D (CA) coming in just days ! Economically we are done, stick a fork in it. But our future will be determined by the loss of our 2nd Amendment or our ability to fight back and survive.
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Walkabout
Dec. 31, 2012 at 2:56pmI ceased believng that the stock market was real about 6 to 9 months ago after reading Zerohedge.
They should the effect of Bernanke’s Quantitative easing on the Stock market. Pot it over time. Each time there is a QE the stock market goes up & then stalls. After a dip, TPTB decide another QE is order & the stock market goes up again. That blithering fool of a president says “look the stock market is going up & it broke 13,000″.
Well as Zerohedge pointed out the each QE has had diminishing returns. By this summer no QE will be able to substantially move the market & obama will have to live with his mess. Unfortunately so will we.
Oh and Egypt will run out of foreign currency reserves by this time next year if not earlier. Which means imports of food (Egypt needs quite a bit) will not be available or will be very expensive. obama got the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) & now we will pay for it in the next 12 months.
Egypt depletes its’ foreign currency reserves by ~ 1 billion a month. Last summer they had about 14 billion left. Unless that trend has changed, do the math.
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kat747
Dec. 31, 2012 at 11:12amHey Wall Street……….show Obama who is really the boss !
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Mandors
Dec. 31, 2012 at 11:08amThe market has already priced in the utter incompetency of this President and Congress. Barry wants to go over the cliff because it gets him 90% of what he wants. Boehner is a crying eunuch who can’t hold his ground and punishes the only people his pathetic “power” allows him to.
See ya at the bottom everybody!
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Walkabout
Dec. 31, 2012 at 2:27pmIf the stock market prices in events that will probably foreseeable happen in the next 6 months, then aye they have.
More importantly each QE has had diminishing returns. So Bernanke can’t do much more to prop up the stock market. bho will not be able to crow about a rising stock market anymore because it will not appreciably rise. Blame will fall on his policies.
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