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That 10.2% Unemployment Report Was The Best Thing That Could Happen To Stocks Joe WeisenthalNov. 9, 2009, 6:56 PM Friday was stunning. After a shock unemployment reading of 10.2%, the market surged. And then, after a weekend of stewing things over, markets rocketed higher again today, and are now comfortably sitting at the highs of the year. So why the powerful rally despite the so-so fundamentals? Maybe because rising unemployment guarantees a continuation of sub-0% interest rates. Think about it. In recent months, stocks have maintained a tight 1-to-1 inverse correlation with the dollar. As the dollar declines, stocks go...

Why is the Stock Market Rising When The Economic Recovery is Weak? Stock-Markets / US Interest Rates Nov 10, 2009 - 04:35 AM By: John_Mauldin "Why" many ask, "is the stock market going up when the bond market is telling us the recovery will be tepid? Isn't there a disconnect?" And the answer is that there is, and this week good friend and fishing buddy Paul McCulley of PIMCO fame discusses that very topic with his usual insight and wit. He poses the conundrum that those expecting a "V" shaped recovery have pushed risk assets up quite high, and that...

Stocks Rocket To Biggest Gains Of 2009 Vince VenezianiNov. 9, 2009, 4:03 PM Today was one for the record books. The Dow Jones Industrial Average hit its 2009 year high today, going as high 10,228 in late afternoon trading and finishing at 10,227. The NASDAQ didn't do too bad either, ending up 41 points at 2154. The S&P 500 was able to gain 23 points to close at 1093. The Federal Reserve today also released a survey that shows banks are still limiting the amount of credit offered to both businesses and consumers. The market couldn't have cared less. Gold...

Stock Market Investors Needn’t Fear A Double-Dip Economic Recession Nov 09, 2009 - 05:56 AM By: Money_Morning Jon D. Markman writes: A new report contains some very good news for investors: Double-dip recessions are very rare. That means that a drop back into recessionary conditions looks less and less likely even as unemployment creeps higher and has crossed the 10% threshold for the first time in a quarter century. After reviewing U.S. economic history all the way back to the 1850s, Deutsche Bank AG (NYSE: DB) economists found that double-dip recessions are exceedingly rare: There have only been three episodes...

U.S. stocks rallied Thursday as another bout of upbeat economic data and positive results from Cisco Systems Inc. lifted the Dow Jones Industrial Average back above the 10,000 level with its biggest daily rise in points since July 15.

Prechter: The 2008 Crash Was Merely A Warmup Joe WeisenthalNov. 5, 2009, 6:19 AM Elliot Wave analyst Bob Prechter explained to Maria Bartiromo why this market rally is kaput. The internals are ugly, momentum is breaking down, valuations are too high, and everyone's too bullish. He ominously described the 2008 crash as a warmup, and he likes Treasuries.[snip](click on the site to see the video)

When The U.S. Dollar Rallies, The Stock Market Will Crash Currencies / US Dollar Nov 04, 2009 - 07:03 PM By: Mike_Whitney Interest rates. The Fed does not need slinky women in plunging necklines to peddle money. All it needs is low interest rates. When rates are pushed lower than the rate of inflation, the Fed provides a subsidy for borrowing. This is not as hard to grasp as it sounds. If I offered to give you $1.00 for very 90 cents you gave me in return, you would buy as many dollars from me as you could. The Fed...

Posted Nov 02, 2009 11:00am EST By Aaron Task in Investing Stocks rose sharply early Monday, quelling concerns (for now at least) about another rout after Friday's big decline. As Wells Capital's Jim Paulsen might say, the very fact so many people were worried about a possible crash Monday is a sign of the prevailing bearish sentiment. The market will continue to climb this proverbial "wall of worry," say bulls like Paulsen. That may well prove true but the past few weeks have reintroduced a level of volatility largely absent since the July lows. Clearly, the tenor of the market...

Will Markets Miss Another Shot At A Healthy Correction? Ron Coby Nov 02, 2009 9:05 am Every time they're ready to break down, they rally instead. My favorite Peanuts cartoon was Charlie Brown and Lucy with the football. I’m sure you all remember them: Lucy convinces Charlie Brown she’ll hold the ball while he kicks it. But every time Charlie Brown runs to kick the ball, Lucy pulls it away, leaving Charlie Brown flat on his back , crying out in pain and disillusionment . Well, that’s how the bears have felt since March. They’ve played the part of Charlie...

High Exposure To Equities? Be Careful Out There By: The Housing Time Bomb November 01, 2009 I just wanted to hop on tonight and issue a warning to anyone who has participated in this rally or has a high exposure to equities. The price action Friday was absolutely frightening! I guess it was perfect timing considering Halloween was Saturday night. IMO it is time to lighten up considerably if you are on the long side. As most of you know, this blog focuses more on the macro/long term outlook on the economy. I have remained consistently bearish because we have...

Global Markets In Review: Reversal In Financial Markets Prieur du Plessis November 01, 2009 Rewind the movie to before the stock market lows of March 9: Stocks down, corporate bonds down, commodities and gold down, emerging-market currencies down, safe havens in fashion, including the U.S. dollar and government bonds. In short, risky assets closed sharply lower over the past few days as concerns mounted over the outlook for central bank policy and the sustainability of the global economic recovery, with investors only warming momentarily to the U.S. emerging from recession as shown by the Q3 GDP report (announced on the...

The US Recession Is Not Over, But The Stock Market Party Is Economics / Recession 2008 - 2010 Oct 31, 2009 - 08:17 AM By: Andrew_Butter “Technically” it’s over, perhaps, but that 3.5% annualized was entirely due to the government borrowing money and giving it to people to spend on things that will not generate long-term economic value: Cash for Clunkers (1%) + $8,000 New Homebuyers (1%) + Government Spending (0.5%) + This and That (1%) = 3.5%. To achieve that superb magic trick the government took on how much debt? I’m not going to bother with trying to unpick...

Stocks Get Spooked By Elizabeth Trotta 10/31/09 - 02:56 PM EDTNEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Volatility spiked, and a strengthening dollar, compounded with a soft consumer spending report and sustainability fears, made for a dreary close to the month and what one observer called "a precarious position." October held true to its reputation as a bad month for stocks: The Dow Jones Industrial Average edged up less than one half of a point; the S&P 500 lost just less than 2%; and the Nasdaq fell 3.6%. Much of those losses materialized Friday. The Dow lost 249.85 points, or 2.5%, to 9709,...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Stocks tumbled Friday, more than erasing the previous session's gains, as investors dumped a variety of shares at the end of a rough week and choppy month on Wall Street. The Dow Jones industrial average (INDU) lost nearly 250 points, or 2.5%, according to early tallies. The Dow lost as much as 278 points earlier. It was the Dow's biggest one-day selloff on a point basis since April 20. The S&P 500 (SPX) index fell 30 points, or 2.8% and the Nasdaq composite (COMP) shed 52 points, or 2.5%. The selloff was broad based, with all...

NYSE Open Disrupted By Flood Of Orders On 2:44 pm EDT, Friday October 30, 2009 NEW YORK (Reuters) - A huge influx of orders prevented the New York Stock Exchange from disseminating quotes shortly after the start of trading on Friday. (NYSE:NYX - News; Paris:NYX.PA - News), the parent of the exchange, said the delays followed "an inordinate influx" of orders received as Friday's session got under way. Later in the session, the company had to temporarily transfer quote processing to a backup system. The exchange's quote delays caused some tickers to be locked, but an NYSE spokesman said "trades...

Wall Street Tumbles On Recovery Woes Wed Oct 28, 2009 5:36pm EDT By Ellis Mnyandu NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. stocks tumbled in a broad sell-off on Wednesday, sending the benchmark S&P 500 lower for a fourth straight day, after weak data on new home sales heightened concerns about the pace of the economic recovery. Financials, technology, materials and industrial sectors, which underpinned the market's advance from March, bore the brunt of the slide as investors reassessed their bets. "The housing data definitely created an additional leg down in the market," said Mike O'Rourke, chief market strategist at institutional brokerage...

Jeremy Grantham: The Sucker's Rally Is Almost Over Posted Oct 27, 2009 08:30am EDT by Henry Blodget: Jeremy Grantham of Boston-based GMO called the crash. He also called the rally. He also called a whole bunch of stuff before that--although, as he is the first to admit, like other value folks, he does have the habit of being early. Not this time, though. Within days of the March low, Jeremy published "Reinvesting While Terrified," in which he observed that it was time to bet the farm. He soon called for a stimulus-fueled rally that would take the S&P 500 to...

Why Is the Market Going Up When Jobs Are Going Down? Invest With An Edge October 26, 2009 Brandon Clay Last month the national unemployment average rose to 9.8%. It’s actually at 17% if you count distressed and underemployed workers. Not only is unemployment data weak, it’s getting worse. Former Fed chairman Alan Greenspan said unemployment would hit at least 10% before turning back. Even with this well-known data, the market is going up. The S&P 500 is sporting a mostly gentle uptrend from March to October. The market thinks we’re recovering. Bernanke and company have said as much. However,...

How Much Juice Is Left In This Bear Market Rally? By Bill BonnerOctober 23, 2009 10/23/09 Waterford, Ireland – Since it peaked in 2007, the UK stock market lost 60% of its value. As of yesterday, it had recovered half of what it had lost. All over the world, the story is about the same. Markets have recovered half or more of what they gave up. The US is a laggard. While the S&P is up 60%, the Dow isn’t yet at the halfway point. Some foreign markets, meanwhile, have 100% + gains. Fund managers who missed the rally are...

Dow Falls Below 10,000 As 'Sell The News' Prevails By Elizabeth Trotta 10/23/09 - 04:24 PM EDT NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- The Dow fell below 10,000, and the major averages retreated Friday, as better than expected data and earnings from Microsoft(MSFT Quote) and Amazon(AMZN Quote) did little for other stocks in a "sell the news" environment. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 109.13 points, or 1.1%, to 9,972.18, while the S&P 500 gave up 13.31 points, or 1.2%, to 1079.60. The Nasdaq edged down 10.82 points, or 0.5%, to 2154.47. Microsoft and Amazon shares were higher by 5.6% and 26.7%,...

Stocks Mixed, But Tech Brightens By Elizabeth Trotta 10/23/09 - 10:26 AM EDT NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- The major averages were mixed midmorning Friday despite better than expected existing-home sales data and warmly received earnings from Microsoft(MSFT Quote) and Amazon(AMZN Quote). The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 38 points, to 10,044, while the S&P 500 gave up 2 points, to 1091. The Nasdaq advanced 13 points, to 2178. Stocks were briefly lifted by report a from the National Association of Realtors that showed existing-home sales rose more than expected in September, to 5.57 million, from 5.09 million the month prior...

Stocks Fall Ahead Of Close By Elizabeth Trotta 10/21/09 - 03:39 PM EDT NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Oil surged more than $2 but stocks sold off early heading into the close Wednesday as Wall Street raised the bar for earnings. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was recently down 59 points, to 9983, while the S&P 500 shed 5 points to 1086. The Nasdaq gave up 6 points to 2157. Earnings remained in focus, as Yahoo!(YHOO Quote) and Morgan Stanley(YHOO Quote) were still 3.2% and 6.2% higher, respectively, after after strong quarterly reports. Boeing(BA Quote) shares, on the other hand, were...

A Big, Fat Stock Market Selloff By Eric Fry 10/20/09 Laguna Beach, California – Stocks prices are very, very high… Our contrarian colleagues over at The 5-Minute Forecast continuously lament…which means that the collective anxiety of investors is very, very low. Our colleagues don’t mind that a rising stock market is adding trillions of dollars to the asset side of household balance sheets. That’s good news. But the worrisome part is that a falling stock market could erase those trillions from the ledger just as quickly as they first appeared. And as our colleagues correctly point out, rising share prices,...

Harry Dent Sees A Big Crash Coming, Urges Investors To Prepare By Rocky Vega 10/20/09 Stockholm, Sweden – In an interview with Moneynews, Harry Dent, author of The Roaring 2000s Investor and The Great Depression Ahead, said that “deflation in turn will trigger crashes in stocks, bonds and real estate.” According to Dent, the deflation will be caused by “way too much debt in our system,” and he advises investors to stay in cash. His debt calculation includes corporate at $11 trillion, government at $14 trillion, and the financial sector at $17 trillion. The solution he suggests is that “we...

Dow Could Go To 13,000. But Will Likely Reverse (Suddenly) By More Than 20% Stock-Markets / Articles Oct 20, 2009 - 07:21 AM By: Andrew_Butter This is the analysis used to predict in May that the Dow would reach 10,000 without a major reversal, (personally I didn’t expect then that it would happen so quickly). I’ve put on my estimate of where I reckon it is now (in red). It’s approaching the “danger zone” (dotted black ring), although reversals when the mispricing is negative tend to be more restrained. That analysis was based on two lines of logic, the first...

The Market Suspense Continues by: David Brown October 20, 2009 On Monday of last week, I posed the question whether the market was about to break out or top out, and for most of the week breaking out seemed the likelier outcome. The plethora of positive earnings, together with better-than-expected revenue from a number of major players -- Google (GOOG); JP Morgan (JPM); Intel (INTC), among others -- fueled the market onward with the Dow crossing 10,000 and the S&P 500 approaching 1,100. The economic indicators were generally good as well, with slightly improved new jobless claims, a very pleasant...

October 2007 Shows Us How This Rally Ends By Ron Coby On 2:10 pm EDT, Monday October 19, 2009 Crisis, What Crisis? As I scroll through hundreds of charts, I continually see that markets are right back to where they were before this credit crisis began. It's almost like investors have completely forgotten why markets collapsed more than 50%. They must believe the Federal Reserve has once again saved the day. Who can blame them really? The Fed saved the day in 1987, 1997, 1998, and 2001, so why not today? You know the formula: Markets correct or crash, the...

Wall St Week Ahead: Earnings Blitz To Test Market's Mettle Sun Oct 18, 2009 10:53am EDT By Ellis Mnyandu NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. stocks could slip this week if the spate of earnings from bellwethers including Apple Inc (AAPL.O) and Caterpillar Inc (CAT.N) do not live up to heightened expectations. After a 60 percent run-up in the stock market since March and the Dow again eclipsing 10,000, investors believe the market is priced to perfection. So if earnings fail to hold up their end, stocks could come under pressure.[snip]

Dow 10,000: Show Me The (Real) Money Tim Price October 18, 2009 And you thought you had broken even. If investors had bought gold when the Dow first closed above 10,000 in March 1999, they'd be up almost 280%. Put another way, Dow 10,000 a decade ago “cost” 36 ounces of gold, treating each Dow point as $1. When the Dow revisited that level Wednesday, it was worth only 9.276 ounces of gold. In oil terms, the Dow has gone from 609 barrels to 133. - The Wall Street Journal on "Dow 10,000." There were somewhat half-hearted celebrations last week...

The Dow Jones Index Average (DJIA) closed above 10,000 yesterday. Unfortunately, hardly any American understands the reasons for the increase and bounce off the March lows. Most DJIA companies receive at least half of their revenues from abroad. Coca Cola (KO), McDonald's (MCD), Procter and Gamble (PG) have been expanding overseas for decades. Even Wal-Mart (WMT)--unfairly stereotyped as a rural, "red state" store--has been expanding aggressively in Mexico, the U.K., and the EU. Why are these international forays relevant? Over the past year, the American dollar has collapsed. The Canadian dollar, once the laughingstock of the world, is almost at...

Why Dow 10,000 Is About As Meaningless As You’d Expect By Rocky Vega 10/15/09 Stockholm, Sweden – Now that Wall Street hearts are a-flutter with Dow 10,000, it’s worth taking a moment to figure out what the Dow Jones Industrial Average actually tells us about its components. The Dow is a share price-weighted average, meaning that when the index is figured out the companies with larger share prices carry more weight. This means that the companies currently with the largest share prices make up a greater portion of the Dow’s weight than other companies with a lower share price. These...

U.S. Stock Markets Disconnected From Reality Stock-Markets / Market Manipulation Oct 15, 2009 - 03:57 AM By: John_Browne Earlier this year, I predicted that the 2009 rally in U.S. stocks could bring the Dow Jones Index as high as 10,000. It looks like that level has been achieved. If, at this point, the index reverses course, I would have made a fairly good prediction. However, it is important to get beyond the charts and look at the fundamentals. The furious six-month rally in the stock market has certainly not been mirrored by the economy as a whole. Instead, the country...

NEW YORK (Dow Jones)--U.S. stocks rallied Wednesday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average pushing above 10000 for the first time in a year on better-than-expected quarterly reports from Intel and JPMorgan Chase, and as improved retail sales data lifted Caterpillar and a wave of other industrials. Since hitting a 2009 closing low of 6547.05 March 9, the Dow has tacked on 53% in the past seven months. For Wednesday, the index closed up 144.80 points, or 1.47%, at 10015.86, marking its biggest one-day gain since Aug. 31. The measure hadn't traded at 10000 since Oct. 7, 2008, and hadn't closed...

Blue Chips Reclaim 10000 By DONNA KARDOS YESALAVICH The Dow Jones Industrial Average hit the 10,000 mark Wednesday afternoon, reaching the psychologically important level for the first time in more than a year, as strong earnings reports from Inteland J.P. Morgan Chaseboosted sentiment. The closely watched market measure last traded above 10,000 on Oct 7, 2008, and hasn't closed above that level since Oct 3, 2008. Its return to that level represents a big milestone in the stock market's huge climb back up over the past seven months from its March lows. As of Tuesday's close, the Dow was up...

The Biggest Bust Will Follow The Biggest Bubble By Bill Bonner 10/13/09 London, England Our ‘Crash Alert’ flag goes back up the pole… October is almost half over. Will we get through the month without a major sell-off? Dear reader, if you think we know the answer to that you’ve got us mixed up with someone else. Someone who is crazy. No one with his wits about him thinks he knows what the stock market is going to do. Still, here at The Daily Reckoning, we have our hunches. We think it’s time for a major pull back. Frankly, we’ll...

Stock Market Bull Trap Heading For A 50% Crash To 5,000 Stock-Markets / Financial Crash Oct 13, 2009 - 11:00 AM By: Captain_Hook At the risk of getting ahead of myself prior to being able to confirm the turn, I am suggesting stock market action over the past week bears the distinct odor of a bull trap, with even informed technicians still waiting for a push to 50% retracements on the indexes. In this respect then, you should realize the context of such a bull trap would be profound in that we are talking about the March lows being tested...

Are Stocks Ripe For Another Black Monday? By Simon Maierhofer Tuesday October 13, 2009 Investors usually see red when Wall Street has a 'black' day. There have been a number of black days, such as Black Monday, Black Thursday, Black Friday and Black Tuesday. Even though the various black days have been spread out over centuries, there's one thing they all have in common. They arrived unexpectedly. If they were expected, they wouldn't be considered 'black.' Black Mondays In finance, Black Monday refers to Monday, October 19th, 1987. But did you know there were actually three Black Monday's?[snip]

The Stock Market Isn't A Leading Indicator Mike Mish Shedlock Oct 12, 2009 3:20 pm When it comes to recessions, the stock market is only good for hindsight. Inquiring minds are wondering if the stock market is a leading indicator. Consider the following charts: S&P Monthly Chart 1980-1992 Vertical bars on the chart show when recessions began. There were three recession in this period -- starting January 1980, July 1981, and July 1990 -- according to National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) Business Cycle Expansions and Contractions data. The NBER is the official determinant of recessions. Looking at a chart...

The Most Hated Stock Market Rally In Wall Street History Stock-Markets / Financial Markets 2009 Oct 10, 2009 - 05:06 AM By: Anthony_Cherniawski The rebound in U.S. consumer spending, driven by government stimulus, will wane as the unemployment rate surpasses 10 percent, a survey of economists showed. “You just can’t see a lot of strength on the consumer side given how battered income is from job losses and weak hourly wage growth,” said David Greenlaw, chief fixed-income economist at Morgan Stanley & Co. in New York. “We’ve got a gradual recovery in the overall economy, but it’s not vigorous enough...

Did Gold Traders Stage A Bear Raid On The US Dollar? Joe WeisenthalOct. 9, 2009, 1:24 PM This week's report in The Independent that the various oil-producing states were planning on dumping the US Dollar set the tone for a horrible rout of the greenback that only moderately with the help of some Asian intervention. There weren't many folks who took the details of the report too seriously -- it was very cloak & daggery, and the author Robert Fisk has a definite agenda -- but there was probablly something to the idea that countries like Saudi Arabia and China...

The weak dollar plays a crucial role in the stock market's recent climb with dollar-based commodity stocks including energy, basic materials, mining and multinationals all benefiting from the greenback's decline. "Investors appear anxious to move funds to hard commodities and commodity- based equities as a hedge against the falling dollar," Fred Dickson, chief market strategist, Davidson Cos., wrote in a research note. "We continue to look for the stock market to remain volatile and remain closely tied to the daily movement of the dollar," Dickson added. Helping trigger another sell-off in the dollar and rally in commodities was news overnight that Australia...

A Dow Double in 10 years? EASY. (DIA) The other day, money manager Neil Hennessy provoked outrage, OUTRAGE I say, when he suggested that the Dow Jones Industrial Average would double in ten years. People went apoplectic, judging by the comments below that video. I'm defending his call not because I'm all that bullish on equities, but because a rational breakdown of the index shows he's likely right. The screaming from the bears (those who think we're headed lower) is as light on actual analysis as is the hype from stock promoters who think we're always headed higher(without offering a...

10-Year Bull Market Has Begun; Dow Will "Double For Sure", Hennessy Says Posted Oct 01, 2009 08:00am EDT Peter Gorenstein in Investing The Dow Jones Industrial rose 15% in the third quarter, closing the book on its best 3-month span in 11 years. Skeptics calls it a classic bear market rally. Neil Hennessy, chief investment officer of the Hennessey Funds, has a more positive assessment. Much more positive. "I think we're starting a 10-year bull market," he claims. During that time, he believes, the Dow will "double for sure" from current levels. His reasoning?[snip]

A retail downgrade by Saks and larger than anticipated jobless filings, coupled perhaps with nervousness over Friday's jobs report (8:30am) led the market to a broad decline, which accelerated into fresh lows in the last hour.

The Financial Crash, U.S. Dollar, Cash and Gold Sep 16, 2009 - 09:21 AM By: Tarek_Saab With the Dow continuing its steady climb into September, economists are giddy with enthusiasm as they usher forth a stream of emotional pontification throughout the news media. Calls for a new bull market and an end to the recession are increasing with the rising levels of optimism (see: MarketWatch). How anyone can be bullish on stocks despite the innumerable economic warning signs is beyond my comprehension. The recent figures in the Daily Sentiment Index reporting that traders are 89-90% bullish is a testament to...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The market keeps chugging along. But with speculative stocks like AIG and Vonage leading the way, you have to wonder if the rally won't soon go off the rails like Ozzy Osbourne's Crazy Train. Ay-Ay-Ay! AIG (AIG, Fortune 500) is up more than 260% this month for no apparent good reason. Shares of Internet phone company Vonage (VG) had quadrupled this week before pulling back Friday. Apparently, Google's renewed interest in online voice chatting was viewed as a potential boost for Vonage -- even though the opposite is probably true since Google (GOOG, Fortune 500) tends...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Wall Street tumbled near midday Friday, after a weaker-than-expected consumer sentiment report sparked a mass exodus following a big rally. The Dow Jones industrial average (INDU) lost 150 points, or 1.6%, more than two hours into the session. The S&P 500 (SPX) index fell 17 points, or 1.7%. The Nasdaq composite (COMP) lost 37 points, or 1.9%. Declines were broad based, with all but 1 of the Dow's 30 components falling. The biggest losers were Boeing (BA, Fortune 500), IBM (IBM, Fortune 500), Chevron (CVX, Fortune 500), Exxon Mobil (XOM, Fortune 500), McDonald's (MCD, Fortune 500)...

ISLAMIC INDEX: New index from Dow Jones will give investors exposure to 100 non-US Shariah compliant companies. (Getty Images)Dow Jones Indexes announced on Wednesday it has licensed the Dow Jones Islamic Market International Titans 100 Index to Javelin Investment Management, an investment adviser registered with the SEC. The blue-chip index will underlie the first Shari'ah compliant exchange-traded fund listed in the US - the JETS Dow Jones Islamic Market International Index Fund (JVS). The index measures the stock performance of 100 leading non-US companies that have passed rules-based screens for Shari'ah compliance. To determine their eligibility firms are screened based...

Where will the Dow Jones Industrial Average be on December 31, 2009? A Daily Poll.

The Dow Jones industrials ($INDU) fell more than 100 points for a second straight day as stocks were dragged lower by sagging retail and metal stocks. Financial stocks were also among the laggards because of concerns about how the Obama administration's proposals to streamline and tighten regulation of the financial services industry would affect those companies' profits. The Dow was down 107 points, or 1.3%, to 8,505. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index ($INX) was off 12 points, or 1.3%, to 912, and the Nasdaq Composite Index ($COMPX) fell 20 points, or 1.1%, to 1,796. The blue-chip index has fallen...