Obama is giving his big speech tonight, so what better time for the European Central Bank to announce a bond-buying program and send global markets soaring? Didn’t Mitt Romney spend half his convention insulting Europe? Didn’t he recently travel to Europe and insult basically everyone he met? It must be a giant payback! Wouldn’t Rush Limbaugh agree?
The U.S. Dow Jones industrial average was up 217.11 points, or 1.66 percent, at 13,264.59 late afternoon in New York. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index was up 26.43 points, or 1.88 percent, at 1,429.87, its highest level in four years.
The rise in U.S. stocks was helped by reports showing American companies added staff in August at the fastest clip in five months and an improvement in service sector employment. A third report showed new claims for jobless benefits fell last week to the lowest level in a month.
U.S. private employers added a stronger-than-expected 201,000 jobs in August, according to payrolls processor ADP, while the government said new claims for jobless benefits fell last week to the lowest level in a month.
The data was the latest to hint U.S. economic growth may be recovering, and it raised chances the government’s more comprehensive monthly jobs report on Friday could be stronger than economists expect.
“Today’s U.S. reports all beat expectations to put a positive spin on the risks as we approach Friday’s U.S. jobs data,” said Michael Englund, chief economist at Action Economics in Boulder, Colorado.
People are getting jobs. People are making money on their savings and investments. President Clinton promised that this would happen last night, and it’s coming true already!!
Sometimes it sucks to be Mitt Romney.
To quote sickeningly delicious Fish Sandwich: I’m lovin’ it.
Unfortunately, I’m not sure that Obama will be able to incorporate much of this into his speech tonite. Except for overconfident, aged, B+ class Hollywood actors and supremely confident A+++ politicians, most people can’t really do political improv under the kind of pressure that Obama will be under.
re: Paul (sub 3 hour marathon) Ryan, Todd (no baby a rape baby) Akins, Alex (Romney is so screwed) Castellanos
Is it true Betty White will be on to counterpoint Eastwood?
Fingers crossed predictions are right and that jobs report come out in good territory tomorrow.
Michael Steele on Hardball just now. I don’t remember every seeing his so cranky, ha!
Sometimesit always sucks to be Mitt Romney.Amanda Marcotte is kicking ass and John Lewis’s speech made me shed a couple of tears.
Boo…dude…celebrating the ECB’s continuation of Keynesian-Bernacke cheap money, currency-debasing policies is like a crack addict celebrating the arrival of more crack…feels good until you come down of your high…you can always prevent the crash by taking more crack…in the end you only have two options–come down off your high, or die.
The only sobriety is a fiat currency pegged to gold…
(Charles Lane’s article in WAPO is bullcrap)
Between your cheap-money-induced-stock-market high, and your Clinton high, you’re flying…
Let’s check in a week from now, when the high wears off…we’ll settle in for six weeks of trench warfare…
May the best vision for America win!
yeah, yeah, yeah.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HeTkT5-w5RA
William Jennings Bryan. You shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of Gold.
Take a suck a that, asshole.
as long as he’s being respectful, there’s no need for that kind of name calling. He wants to debate fiat currency. Engage or ignore.
Some days I almost wish Milton Friedman was still alive. Almost…
Milton Friedman was the the guy who could not go quite all the way…
He wanted a Constitutional Amendment to peg Federal Spending to a percentage of GDP…
He also advocated a limit on the amount that the Federal Reserve could increase the money supply per annum…he said 3 percent…
He couldn’t go all the way…
Which human decides three percent?
Don’t get me wrong…Reagan and Friedman had the most impact on my formative years…I love those two!
Right.
Sure.
Let him debate 100 year old arguments with 150 year old people.
He’ll STILL get his ass kicked.
Thank you.
Have you really been banning his various incarnations, or is he just making that up? I haven’t seen anything that imo merits banning, but it’s been a while since I’ve read the forum rules, too…
“currency-debasing policies”
You people have been crying wolf about imminent inflation for 3-1/2 half years, and what have we gotten? Extremely low inflation.
Give it a rest.
Aretha rockin’ the house!
It sucks to be Willard whenever the fulfillment of his desires is dependent upon people liking him…
Seriously! as my kids would say.
ADP is one of the worst reporters of employment numbers even when using rounded data.
As to savings interest rates have been at historic lows since Long Term Capital Collapsed.
The stock market is a bubble based on the same low rates. As to the public being in the market not for some time. See ritholtz. com
You’ve much to crow about but this isn’t it.
About time, ECB!
Woot woot!
(I wonder: are the Austrians actually Austrians?)
“People are making money on their savings and investments.”
Unfortunately, that’s not really true, the retail investor is staying out of the market due to the belief that they’re crooked. The stock gains are being pocketed mostly by the investment bank’s computerized margin trades and large institutionals who still aren’t meeting their needs to make pension payouts etc.
The mom and pops, as they’re called, are staying in the bond market. With T-bills under 2%, there’s not a lot income available for them
Okay. And my passively managed 401k has more than doubled since Obama has been in office.
Then your one of the few.
Sounds like your into index funds, Did you start in 2008? Or is that when when you start measuring? ‘Cause if you’ve always been solely into index funds then you would have lost 30-50% in 2007-08 and recovered it over the last four years.
Market high October 9, 2007 – DJ. 14,164.53
Market Low March 9, 2009 – DJ. 6507.04
Today DJ. 13306.64
So even today the DJ is 800 under the 2007 high.
So either you started your 401k in 2009, or only really started to put money into it then, or you’re in a a high risk fund and got lucky, because most aggressive funds did less than the index, or you work for Goldman Sachs.
If none of these apply please tell me your strategy, no snark intended.
But then, I hear Romney had done pretty good with his 401k.
Add:
Investors yank $3.7 billion out of stocks
“The move out of the U.S. stock market continued through the final week of summer, as investors remained stuck in a rut and refrained from making any big moves ahead of Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke’s big speech in Jackson Hole.
In fact, investors pulled another $3.7 billion from U.S. stock market mutual funds during the week ended Aug. 31, according to the Investment Company Institute, bringing the 2012 outflow total to more than $76 billion. By comparison, those funds lost in the neighborhood of $70 billion during the first eight months of 2011, and just $52 billion during the first eight months of 2010.
Related: Bill Gross says investors better get used to stunted returns
According to the preliminary data that is frequently revised, investors yanked more than $14 billion out of the stock market in August, the most since April.
While investors have been fleeing U.S. stock mutual funds, they’ve been plowing into bonds, which are considered safe haven investments. In fact, bond funds raked in $6.6 billion last week, according to ICI data, and attracted more than $29 billion throughout August.
Related: Trading volume at 5-year low. Don’t panic
Hybrid funds, which invest in both stocks and bonds, have also been in favor among investors. Hybird funds brought in $866 million last week, and $5.4 billion last month.”