Stocks jump on positive economic reports
Pending home sales and durable goods orders are up more than expected. German and French leaders are set to meet ahead of the eurozone summit. Best Buy may go private.
Updated at 12:27 p.m. ET
By Andrea Tse
Stocks rose Wednesday after better-than-expected reports on durable goods and pending home sales.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average ($INDU) was up 93 points at 12,628. The S&P 500 ($INX) was up 13 points at 1,333. The Nasdaq Composite ($COMPX) was up 27 points at 2,881.
"The housing market is clearly superior this year compared with the past four years," Lawrence Yun, the NAR's chief economist, said in a statement. "We're on track to see a 9 to 10 percent improvement in total sales for 2012."
The Commerce Department reported that durable goods orders rose 1.1% to $217.2 billion in May, better than the expected rise of 1%, according to Briefing.com. Still, April's figure was cut to a 0.2% decrease. Excluding transportation, new orders increased 0.4%, and excluding defense, new orders increased 0.7%.
"There is nothing in today's report to change the view that orders and shipments are likely to be weak in the second quarter," cautioned Dan Greenhaus, the chief global strategist at BTIG. "Shipments of core goods are a proxy for an important component of the GDP report were up a modest 0.4%, only partially recouping some of April's move lower."
In Europe, German Chancellor Angela Merkel was scheduled to meet with French President Francois Hollande in Paris on the eve of the two-day eurozone summit after Merkel's reassertion that her country objects to shared liability.
Germany, however, may consider the idea of eliminating the preferred creditor status of the European rescue fund, which is believed to have discouraged investors from taking up sovereign debt for fear of much steeper losses if a default were to occur.
"Markets are waiting for nothing to happen, with the euro heads of government summit looming on the horizon," said Paul Donovan, a global economist at UBS. "Expectations have been lowered so much that it is just possible that markets react positively to any decision. Alternatively, markets look at the broken structure of the euro and ask, 'Is that it?'"
The FTSE in London was up 0.97%, and the DAX in Germany was up 0.65%.
Hong Kong's Hang Seng index closed up 1.03%, and the Nikkei in Japan rose 0.77%.
Best Buy (BBY) is reportedly a buyout candidate. According to The Wall Street Journal, founder Richard Schulze is working with bankers to put together a deal to take the company private.
The board of News Corp. (NWSA) will decide Wednesday whether to proceed with a split of the media giant into two companies, according to the Journal. The newspaper, which is owned by News Corp., first reported Monday that the company was mulling separating its smaller publishing business from its entertainment businesses. If the board approves the split, News Corp. is expected to announce the restructuring Thursday morning, a person familiar with the situation told the Journal. News Corp. on Monday confirmed it was contemplating a split.
Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMY) announced an additional $3 billion buyback authorization after Tuesday's close.
More from TheStreet
Lets take a little scientific poll here.
Thumbs up, if you believe both parties are at fault for our current economic and social
crisis.
Thumbs down if you believe that it is only the democrats fault.
If there was a third thumb I would use it for only the republicans, but it is unlikely that
one would get used anyway.
I don' have a problem with your collecting SS and medicare IF you paid into the system legitimately. Worked your whole career, paid your taxes- that's fine . you DESERVE IT.
I will take mine when that day comes , you should get yours.
What I DO have a problem is your constant ranting on sharing the wealth , higher taxation, "fairness",
All the canned, lefty, speak, BS
IF you don't have enough in retirement , it's not my job, or fault or requirement to make you whole.
The gov is NOT your mother!
That's what your problem is it's ALL about - YOU.
People screw up in their lives , don't save enough , OVER SPEND , don't pay their taxes, borrow too much, whatever , then after they screw up --- it's help me ?
Sorry, the gravy train left 20 years ago.
We (taxpayers) can't make EVERYONE 100% whole, 100% of the time.
There is ONLY 48% of us left !
I know this is off the wall but oh well. As a manager I have been trained; both from a formal as well as personal sense, to not allow myself to become personalized in a business situation. The old saying about whoever blinks first is lost is true. I think I am therefore more inclined to support Romney because i understand what he is performing when he frames an issue. When you allow yourself to be overcome by the "personal" rarely does anything good happen. Obama reaction to Arizona is clearly a personal response. Please try and understand Romney has been trained for years how to interact and lead. Sometimes he doesn't have the "get up" of a hyped up reactor or politician but this in the long run is an asset for all of us. We need to have our issues clearly calmy defined before we have any hope of illiciting the support of the people to challenge them.
Throw it out on what basis? If it's constitutional, they have an obligation to uphold it. If it's not, they are obligated to throw it out. It's not the job of the SCOTUS to decide a case based on whether or not they think it's a good or bad idea...
dlh,
Mark Twain Quote -
"Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself."
Congress is the only organization that watches their approval rating plummet into the single
digits and keeps right on making the same mistakes over and over again and expecting
a different result each time.
QUOTE
In Rome, Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti said he would not simply rubber stamp conclusions at the EU summit and said he was ready to go on negotiating into Sunday evening if necessary to agree on measures to calm markets.
END QUOTE
Ah isn't that nice of Monti to extend until Sunday evening the chance to fix the unfixable EU crisis.
Look Europe loaned each other trillions of dollars none of them had to each other. Now that they need to be paid back they are looking to the BRICS to bail them out. But the BRICS 1) don't have the money and 2) still remember the colonial raping they got in the past from Europe and the more recent IMF 33 percent interest rates they were charged.
If the developing countries could pay 33 percent interest rates then Spain and Italy can pay 33 percent interest on their debt.
The Europeans are going down big time.
We had, and still have, plenty of laws on the books that could have held the financial industry accountable........ IF they had just been ENFORCED.
There's a difference.
crisis.
I am going to repeat this since my previous post DISAPPEARED. Is this board censored??
Obviously this would be my vote but I would also include Wall Street and the financial sector. With the growth of the finance sector has come the growth of debt, the stagnation of the middle class and the irresponsible use of "financial innovations' which not only richly rewarded those on Wall Street but which nearly collapsed our financial system. When we had the 'Savings and Loan Scandal' back in the 80's, people were prosecuted and sent to jail. Now Wall Street has such a grip on Democrats and Republicans that not only was the finance sector bailed out but they paid themselves lavish bonuses that year. Talk about rewarding failure!!!!!
The US have a deficient President with no leadership (only dictatorship) and incapable of even managing anything.
You can see Michelle still being pissed off at America, specially when Obama says: "It is fashionable to say that American is doing terribly".
Obama is deportable and let's send him with this Baldwin actor to Crawford Texas to be refreshed by GW about what really matters in our country.
Morale: WE have a president who is literally killing our patriotism in this country.
MG,
Actually Congressional approval ratings are up 8% since the 2010 elections to 17%
Wow, 17%, I'm impressed. It would probably go up to 50% if we replaced the whole damn
bunch, republicans and deomcrats alike.
IMO, its both parties that cause the problems, not just one.
I guess you can say that not much has been accomplished since 2010 so there was nothing
to drive the approval rating down.
I went to refinance my house and found that there is a lien against it. The first loan company I went with in 1990, the loan was sold and resold so many times I lost count. But that first bank was Barclay. The original loan was sold about 7 times and I have refinanced a few times since they had the loan. Luckily I have the paperwork, but I still have to wait for it to clear up. And people wonder why the banking industry is screwing the world over.
Two thumbs down on this post??? Which 2 morons didn't like a (supposedly) factual account of someone trying to refinance and getting screwed by the bank? What could you possibly have against the post? I am consistently amazed at the low wattage of brain power that inhabits this thread...GEEZ...
Since the USA is good at innovation, but then quickly outsources it's manufacturing outside of the USA and then sells it to the US public. It does not generates wealth other than to the CEOs and shareholders. The working class is excluded from the wealth generation.
Therefore I propose that since much new science is produced by our Universities and government research, that we keep all manufacturing related to the new patents produced be keep within the national borders. Drug companies keep their patents to recover their research costs, why shouldn't manufacturing based on new patents?
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