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DOW – 51 = 17,776
SPX – 14 = 2053
NAS -64 = 4727
10 YR YLD + .02 = 2.22%
OIL + 3.22 = 69.37
GOLD + 44.30 = 1213.80
SILV + .88 = 16.56
Last week I said that you can never eat too much pie. I would like to amend that statement.
That was a long weekend. While we were gone, the Dow hit another record hit on Friday, the 31st of the year. Dow stocks are still up about 7% for 2014; with all these record high closes, you might think it would be more, and you might think you could just throw a dart at any of the Dow 30 stocks and hit a winner. Unfortunately, not all Dow stocks were able to revel in the year’s rallies. In fact, nearly one-third of the market’s companies had negative returns this year. Big names that are down, including: Boeing (BA) – down about 7% despite fairly strong sales of airplanes, IBM – down 13% as they try to figure out what their business is, General Electric (GE) – is off about 6%, United Technologies (UTX) – down about 3%, and Chevron (CVX) – down about 6% for the year as oil prices have been sliding.
The oil companies are about the only ones not happy with lower oil prices. On Thursday, as we were enjoying turkey and way too much pie, OPEC was meeting in Vienna and they decided to leave oil production unchanged. That sent oil prices down big on Friday. Then early today, prices dipped all the way down to 63.72 a barrel before recovering to finish up 3.22 at 69.37. Earlier this year, most oil companies expected prices would remain above $90 a barrel; wham bam, next thing you know oil was under $80, and now there are more than a few oil related companies on the ropes and trying to figure out how low prices can go, and how they can survive.
Energy is a cyclical business, and adjusting production to lower prices and lower demand is not uncommon; companies did that in 2008 and 2009, when oil prices collapsed during the recession. Oil companies will have to adjust to lower prices. Right now we don’t know how low the bottom is, and it doesn’t make sense to try to catch a falling knife. Wait and let the market tell us.
The Federal Reserve is welcoming the sharp drop in global energy prices, with two influential policymakers saying today that it should provide a boost to American pocketbooks and shrugging off any pressure on already low inflation, with the thinking that any dis-inflationary problems will be temporary.
