Dow up 43, breaks 6-week losing streak
Traders hope a deal is near to ease the Greek debt crisis. But energy and tech stocks sag. Research In Motion shares are crushed. Apple is down for 2011. Oil hits a 4-month low.
Updated: 7 p.m. ETStocks finished the week mostly higher as investors seemed to conclude that, for now, the Greek debt situation may be easing enough to warrant some buying.
But the picture was not uniform. Tech stocks struggled, and the Nasdaq Composite Index ($COMPX) is now down 1.4% for the year. Shares of BlackBerry maker Research In Motion (RIMM) plunged 21.5% to $27.75 after a disastrous earnings report. Apple (AAPL), off 1.5% to $320.26, is now down for the year, and Google (GOOG) fell 3.1% and ended at $485.02, its first close below $500 since September.
Energy shares also were weak after crude oil (-CL) fell to $93.01 a barrel, a four-month low.
The market's early cheer came as Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou shuffled his Cabinet in a bid to placate critics of the government's austerity plans. And German Chancellor Angela Merkel backed off demands that bondholders share some of the burden of a Greek bailout.
The Dow Jones industrials ($INDU) closed up 43 points to 12,004. The blue chips, however, had been up as many as 112 points, then saw the gain fall to as few as 24 points. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index ($INX) added 4 points to 1,272, but the Nasdaq was off 7 points to 2,616.
Article continues below.Thanks to the better news on Greece, financial stocks are among the top performers in the U.S. market. JPMorgan Chase (JPM) was up 1.1% to $40.80. U.S. shares of French banks BNP Paribas (BNPQY), Credit Agricole (CRARY) and Societe Generale (SCGLY) were all up more than 3%. The trio were cited for possible downgrade this week by Moody's.
The Dow and the S&P 500 ended the week with small gains after six straight weeks of declines. The Nasdaq fell 1%, its sixth weekly loss in seven weeks.
The Dow is up 3.7% for the year, with the S&P 500 up just 1%. The Nasdaq had been up as much as 8.3% on April 29 but has fallen 9% since.
Gasoline is off 7.8% since May 5
Gold settled up $9.20 to $1,539.10 an ounce. While crude in New York is down more than 6% this week, gold is up 0.7%.
Mirroring the decline of crude oil in New York, Brent crude in London was off 77 cents to $113.25 at 4:15 p.m. ET.
The national average retail price of gasoline was $3.675 a gallon, according to AAA's Daily Fuel Gauge Report, down from Thursday's $3.685 and off 7.8% from the May 5 peak of $3.985 a gallon. Gasoline is down 2.8% for the month but up 19.6% for the year. Only Alaska and Hawaii are seeing average unleaded prices above $4 a gallon.
| Markets for the week | ||||||||||||
| 6/17/2011 | 6/10/2011 | % chg. | YTD chg. | |||||||||
| Dow Industrials | 12,004.36 | 11,951.91 | 0.44% | 3.69% | ||||||||
| S&P 500 | 1,271.50 | 1,270.98 | 0.04% | 1.10% | ||||||||
| Nasdaq | 2,616.48 | 2,643.73 | -1.03% | -1.37% | ||||||||
| Russell 2000 | 781.76 | 779.54 | 0.28% | -0.24% | ||||||||
| Crude oil | $93.01 | $99.29 | -6.32% | 1.78% | ||||||||
| (per barrel) | ||||||||||||
| U.S. Dollar Index | 75.46 | 74.80 | 0.89% | -$0.05 | ||||||||
| 10-yr. Treasury | 2.94% | 3.00% | -1.77% | -$0.11 | ||||||||
| Gold | $1,539.10 | 1529.2 | 0.65% | $0.08 | ||||||||
Germany blinks on Greece
The Greek situation took a turn for the better when Germany backed off its demand that bondholders take some of the hit from having to rescue Greece again.
The situation grew very grave this week when protesters hit the streets in Athens, and several members of Papandreou's Socialist party quit in protest of the austerity plans. The yield on Greece’s 2-year bond topped 30% for the first time Thursday in response. (Yes, you're reading 30% right.) The cost of insuring Greek debt rose to an all-time high.
The Guardian newspaper in London reported today that the German about-face was prompted by threats from the International Monetary Fund to withhold urgently needed funds and trigger a Greek default unless Berlin pledged firmly that it would come to Greece's rescue.
France opposed the Germans in part because a Greek default of more than $400 billion in debt might threaten the solvency of major French banks.
At the same time, Evangelos Venizelos became Greece's finance minister today and is believed to have the skills necessary to convince his countrymen to accept new austerity measures. Greece's parliament is supposed to vote on the plan and perhaps a vote of confidence this weekend.
German and British stocks were higher today.
| Energy prices -- New York close | ||||||||||||
| Fri. | Thur. | Month chg. | YTD chg. | |||||||||
| Crude oil (-CL) | $93.01 | $94.95 | -9.44% | 1.78% | ||||||||
| (per barrel) | ||||||||||||
| Heating oil (-HO) | $2.98 | $3.00 | -2.28% | 17.28% | ||||||||
| (per gallon) | ||||||||||||
| Natural gas (-NG) | $4.33 | $4.41 | -7.31% | -1.82% | ||||||||
| (per mil. BTU) | ||||||||||||
| Unleaded gasoline (-RB) | $2.95 | $2.95 | -6.49% | 20.09% | ||||||||
| (per gallon) | ||||||||||||
| Brent crude | $113.21 | $114.02 | -3.02% | 19.48% | ||||||||
| (per barrel) | ||||||||||||
| Retail gasoline | $3.68 | $3.69 | -2.78% | 19.63% | ||||||||
| (per gallon; AAA) | ||||||||||||
A mostly good day for U.S. stocks
Thanks to Greece, stocks were mostly higher. Investors, in fact, were shrugging off news that the IMF had cut its forecast for U.S. economic growth on Friday and warned Washington and debt-ridden European countries that they are "playing with fire" unless they take immediate steps to reduce their budget deficits.
Twenty-three of the 30 Dow stocks were higher, led by AT&T (T), up 1.1% to $30.77, and Microsoft (MSFT), up 1.1% to $24.26, respectively. McDonald's (MCD), up 0.9% to $82.52, hit an all-time high of $83.08 during the session. (Microsoft is the publisher of MSN Money.)
Intel (INTC) and Cisco Systems (CSCO) were the Dow laggards, down 1.1% to $21.19 and 0.5% to $14.97, respectively.
Forty-seven stocks in the Nasdaq-100 ($NDX.X), which tracks the largest Nasdaq stocks, were higher. But the index was down 7 points to 2,194 and is off 1.1% on the year.
The Nasdaq-100's decline was mostly due to Research In Motion's big loss and the declines for Apple and Google. Research In Motion fell after fiscal-first-quarter revenue was short of estimates and its forecast worse.
Research In Motion, maker of the BlackBerry device, is struggling against intense competition from Apple's iPhone and devices using Google's Android platform. Apple and Google were getting no benefit from Research In Motion's woes, however.
Credit-rating companies declined after The Wall Street Journal reported that the Securities and Exchange Commission is considering filing civil fraud charges against some of the firms for their actions on mortgage-backed bonds, which helped trigger the financial crisis.
Moody's (MCO) dropped 5% to $36.35 for the biggest loss in the Standard & Poor's 500 Index. McGraw-Hill (MHP) retreated 3.6% to $39.61.
BJ's Wholesale Club (BJ) saw a 4.1% gain fade to a 0.8% loss to $47.50. Shareholders Leonard Green & Partners and CVC International made a proposal to buy the third-largest U.S. warehouse-club chain. Details of the bid, made on Thursday, were not disclosed.
Oh, those IPO stocks
Wall Street may be frothing over the fees it may get from the host of companies going public, but this week may temper their enthusiasm.
Pandora Media (P), the Internet radio service, went public at $16. The shares opened for trading at $20 and soared to $26. Today, however, they fell to as low as $12.16 before, finally, the shares found buyers. The shares ended up 1.1% to $13.40. Still, the shares ended the week off 16.3% from the IPO price. The shares are even getting "sell" ratings.
Meanwhile, Bankrate (RATE) went public late Thursday at $15 and started trading today with an open at $14. But the shares fell to as low as $13.81 before rallying back to $15.34, up 2.3% from the IPO price.
The volatility reflects a lot of worry. "People are scared of losing money like they did on Pandora," Josef Schuster, founder of Chicago-based IPO research and investment house IPOX Schuster, told Reuters.
| Short hits from the markets -- New York close | ||||||||||||
| Fri. | Thur. | Month chg. | YTD chg. | |||||||||
| Treasury yields | ||||||||||||
| 13-week Treasury bill | 0.03% | 0.04% | -40.00% | -75.00% | ||||||||
| 5-year Treasury note | 1.52% | 1.50% | -9.72% | -24.40% | ||||||||
| 10-year Treasury note | 2.94% | 2.91% | -3.48% | -10.92% | ||||||||
| 30-year Treasury bond | 4.20% | 4.16% | -0.31% | -3.65% | ||||||||
| Currencies | ||||||||||||
| U.S. Dollar Index | 75.461 | 76.224 | 1.02% | -4.83% | ||||||||
| British pound | $1.62 | £1.62 | -1.81% | 3.62% | ||||||||
| (in U.S. $) | ||||||||||||
| U.S. $ in pounds | £0.62 | £0.62 | 1.84% | -3.50% | ||||||||
| Euro in dollars | $1.43 | $1.42 | -0.97% | 6.83% | ||||||||
| (in U.S. $) | ||||||||||||
| U.S. $ in euros | € 0.70 | € 0.70 | 0.98% | -6.40% | ||||||||
| U.S. $ in yen | 80.26 | 80.59 | -1.69% | -1.36% | ||||||||
| U.S. $ in Chinese | 6.50 | 6.47 | -0.08% | -1.80% | ||||||||
| yuan | ||||||||||||
| Canada dollar | $1.020 | $1.019 | -1.38% | 1.64% | ||||||||
| (in U.S. $) | ||||||||||||
| U.S. dollar | $0.981 | $0.981 | 1.39% | -1.61% | ||||||||
| (in Canadian $) | ||||||||||||
| Commodities | ||||||||||||
| Gold (-GC) | $1,539.10 | $1,529.90 | 0.15% | 8.28% | ||||||||
| (per troy ounce) | ||||||||||||
| Copper (-HG) | $4.102 | $4.118 | -1.81% | -7.76% | ||||||||
| (per pound) | ||||||||||||
| Silver (-SI) | $35.7480 | $35.5590 | -6.68% | 15.55% | ||||||||
| (per troy ounce) | ||||||||||||
| Wheat (-ZW) | $6.7225 | 6.7325 | -14.06% | -15.36% | ||||||||
| (per bushel) | ||||||||||||
| Corn (-ZC) | $7.0025 | 7.015 | -6.32% | 12.49% | ||||||||
| (per bushel) | ||||||||||||
| Cotton | $1.4518 | 1.4596 | -8.50% | 0.26% | ||||||||
| (per pound) | ||||||||||||
| Coffee | $2.4955 | 2.579 | -5.69% | 3.76% | ||||||||
| (per pound) | ||||||||||||
| Crude oil (-CL) | $93.01 | $94.95 | -9.44% | 1.78% | ||||||||
| (per barrel) | ||||||||||||
Its all just rigged carnival game now and your on the outside of the circle.
The problem folks is our GOVERNMENT. We have nothing but crooks running our world today. Noone seems to be honest and doesn't give a damn about our country anymore. Time will only tell what will happen and where were heading. Not only is our Government corrupted but our Government should be helping us, not destroying us. It turns out we can't even depend on our own government to help us, when we are in need of major help.
This is not brain surgery people, when manipulators are in complete charge down here we go down, that's their game, that's how they make their money, by cheating others. Yes, we were up over 100 points earlier but then they called to start the selloff and now we are fighting just to stay in the green...We could be up 100, 200, 300, does not matter, when these scumbags start doing their thing down we go. Who are they going to blame it on today? Who cares, doesn't matter. What matters is that manipulators, cheaters, keep bringing this market down. It has absolutely nothing to do with fundamentals. Oh well...More after the close.
When a government writes special treaties and gives tax breaks to public owned corporations to aid them in outsourcing for slave labor you know that government is owned. Banks wall street and big corporations run America and they are destroying our country. Record profits are being made and corporate taxes actually paid are record low.
Our capital gains tax where most giant money is made is only 15%. Our 4 biggest banks have 8 trillion in assets and still get billions in 0% loans to play the market and make foreign investments. Anyone who claims this government is anti-business must be from some other planet.
Our middle class is declining, poverty is growing and the top 1 or 2% take more and more. All we need is for the burden of deficit reduction to go on the struggling people and we will soon be in depression and chaos. Our corrupt financial and corporate systems are a disgrace to America and the human race. There is nothing they want do and there is practically no restraints on them.
When the CEO of Disney made 600 million in salary and God knows what in bonuses he had children working in Haiti for 12 cents an hour. No half liberal government would allow this much help the pigs. Millions of jobs would have been saved just by forcing public owned corporations to pay our minimum wages wherever the go. There are many obvious things that could be done and are not.
In short an insane and deadly greed is destroying our country. Banks, wall street, big corporations and their government are united and they know exactly what they want. "Everything!" We will come together as a people against this evil foursome or we will lose badly and there will be no winners. Greed is never satisfied it is like a monster that devours everything and eventually eats it's own tail.
Kathy, go to the investment home tab and look under the market dispatches tab for the earlier blog/article from the morning. they switchover to charley here in the early afternoon where we night people can post since we usually don't get up until noon anyway.
especially mr. fat cat who doesn't get up until happy hour, unless his maid has instructions to wake him for some early afternoon warm milk in his silver and diamond bowl.
All the Greedy sheeple wear their blinders straight to the slaughter house. 
The Vultures love feasting on the blind sheeple. 
I just love all the gloom and doom stories around the world. The more gloom and doom, the better! I'll have another brandy and coke please! 
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/43432796/ns/business-eye_on_the_economy
jrod, it was YOUR party who got o'bama elected, not "they." YOU voted in the primaries and put an unsophisticated old guy with little education, minimal speaking skills "my friends, my friends, my friend, ....." and a virtual bush clone in front of the voters.
then you mixed in an unbalanced airhead beauty queen who chews blubber and would nuke china first chance she got.
if you have problems with o'bama, go stand in front of the and mirror and say "what an idiot i was" ten thousand times, then go throw away your ron paul and anti-American tea party signs and start working to support a mainstream moderate candidate this time.
yeeeeeesh. look within. ................... 
I just want to say thanks to our government, a lot of our dreams will never become a reality thanks to them. It is unfair we have to suffer the consequences and mistakes they have made. If anyone should be held responsible and accountable it should by ALL MEANS BE THEM. I am in complete awh how the government put us in this mess and now we have to pay the price for their mistakes. What this means is we have to bust our asses to work like dogs just to make a living. We need to eliminate all the crooks, once and for all. Period!!! Question is how do we do that without making the same mistakes again and getting the right people to take over the wheel and head us in the right direction.
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