Marc Pado, strategist for Cantor Fitzgerald made a prediction earlier this week that has come to fruition. He said he thinks we are “very near” the bottom and “all we need is some sort of a catalyst to lift us up.” A few factors provided that catalyst: the price of crude fell modestly, and the government delivered upbeat economic data, including a surprising rise in orders for durable goods, which helped offset ongoing issues in the financial sector. As a result, US stocks tallied modest gains on Friday. The Dow gained 21 points to 11,370, leaving the blue-chip index with a weekly loss of 1.1%.
Of the Dow’s 30 components, 15 ended in positive territory, with Microsoft Corp. up the most, gaining nearly 3%. The greatest drag on the blue-chip index proved to be General Motors Corp. off 8.5% after a generally depressing auto report earlier this week.
S&P is considering downgrading the subordinated debt and preferred stock of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Shares of Fannie fell almost 4%, while Freddie declined 6%.
NASDAQ climbed 30 points (technology stocks have remained strong even in the economic downturn) and energy led sector gains after a bruising week, recovering a bit of value after a low week.
Among financials, Washington Mutual Inc was the disaster-bank of the day as unsecured creditors are losing faith in the nation’s biggest thrift. After losing more than 30% of their value Wednesday and Thursday, the shares were off 0.3%.
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July 26, 2008 at 7:35 am
[...] loss overall, it was encouraging to see that Friday ended in an overall gain, though quite modest. Cara Ellison reports on what helped pull the stock market up yesterday: A few factors provided that catalyst: the price of crude fell modestly, and the government [...]