Stocks opened markedly lower on the day, were mixed during the day and ended it in slightly red, following the release of some economic and corporate nesws.
On the economic front, Commerce Department report showed that personal spending fell by 1.0 percent in December following a revised 0.8 percent decrease in the previous month, marking the sixth consecutive monthly decrease in spending. With most of the job losses coming in the Jan (about 200,000) the consumer spending is going to get even worse from here.
Though personal spending was faling at a faster rate than income (down 0.2%), personal saving as a percentage of disposable personal income was 3.6 percent in December compared with 2.8 percent in November. Though this is off the lows of near 0%, it still is much lower than the historical average of 5.2% in 90,s.
Separately, the Institute for Supply Management said its index of activity in the manufacturing sector unexpectedly rose to 35.6 in January from 32.9 in December, although a reading below 50 still indicates the twelfth consecutive month of contraction in the sector. Hopefully this indicates that the situation does not get any worse.
Much of the hopes are hinged on the stimulus package, but the $819 Bn stimulus package seems to face some resistance from the Republicans as the Senate begins their debate. The main intention of the package should be to atleast stop the job losses, if not job creation, instead of throwing it around like pieces of paper.
I think infrastructure stocks, Healthcare IT stocks, Educational stocks(ceco, coco, esi, dv apol), broad band stocks (esp towers, amt, cci, sbac) would benifit out of the stimuls package. (Should study more about this).
Mood : Sick .. literally, though.
Song: Sweet Pea - Amos Lee (ATT commercial)
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