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Stocks cut earlier gains, and the S&P 500 and Dow turned negative, after new data showed further spikes in coronavirus cases in some densely populated U.S. states. Texas’s virus hospitalizations jumped 11% in 24 hours, according to the state, marking the largest one-day jump since the beginning of the month. The state has in recent days been battling a resurgence in new and serious cases of the coronavirus after beginning to ease lockdown orders. Other populous states including Florida have struggled with similar trends amid their reopenings, with both it and Arizona posting record daily highs for new cases of...

Retail sales rebounded in May as states eased coronavirus-induced lockdown measures, allowing retail stores to regain more ground than analysts expected, according to Department of Commerce data. Retail sales jumped 17.7% in May, effectively doubling expectations and marking the biggest single-month gain in records going back more than 20 years, according to a Commerce Department report released Tuesday. A Bloomberg News survey of economists had anticipated 8.4% increase in retail sales in May as COVID-19-related measures melted away following a 14% decline in April. COVID-19 originated in Wuhan, China, in late December before going global, killing a reported 116,000 people...

V-shaped recovery, here we come? Maaayyybeee, but there is no doubt that today’s advance retail numbers for May show reason for hope. Even while a number of states still enforced lockdowns and restrictions on retail and food service establishments, the Census Bureau announced today that May’s numbers made up all the lost ground in April — and then some.Donald Trump wasted little time taking a victory lap on Twitter over the new numbers: Wow! May retail sales show biggest one-month increase of ALL TIME, up 17.7%. Far bigger than projected. Looks like a BIG DAY FOR THE STOCK MARKET,...

So what do we know with any sort of certainty about the claim that "the pandemic is over"? Very little. Is the pandemic over in China, Europe, Japan and the U.S./Canada? Is the much-anticipated V-Shaped economic recovery already baked in, i.e. already gathering momentum? The consensus, as reflected by the stock market (soaring), the corporate media and governmental easings of restrictions seems to be "yes" to both questions. But science is not a consensus-based activity, and so skeptics of consensus are looking to the sciences of epidemiology, virology, etc., and economics for evidence-based answers. But as scientist and author Michael...

An attempt by the Senate to prevent China from using American investments in Chinese firms against the United States might prove to be self-defeating in the long run. Already an epicenter of anti-Chinese communist sentiment, the Senate on May 20 overwhelmingly approved the "Holding Foreign Companies Accountable Act (S. 945)," a bill that might lead to Chinese firms being barred from listing on U.S. stock exchanges. The bill will require foreign companies doing business in the U.S. to certify they’re not controlled by their governments. They will also have to submit to audits by U.S. regulators for three consecutive years....

Stocks got smoked on Thursday. When the bell rang on Wall Street, all three major indexes were down more than 5%. The Dow fell 6.9%, or 1,861 points, while the S&P 500 fell some 5.9%, or 188 points. By day’s end, all of the S&P 500’s gains in the month of June had been wiped out. The reversal in markets — which followed two mixed, but not terrible sessions for the market — was swift and left many asking the age old question: why? To our minds, four distinct stories converged during Thursday’s trading session, each contributing what became an...

London (CNN Business)The stocks mega-rally hit a roadblock: A somber economic outlook from the US Federal Reserve and the 2 millionth coronavirus case in the United States has investors questioning whether they had boosted the stock market too far, too fast. p.US stocks plummeted in New York, with the Dow (INDU) falling some 1,700 points at its low point. The index was down 1,675 points, or 6.2% with one hour left in the trading day. The S&P 500 (SPX) plummeted 5.5%, and the Nasdaq Composite (COMP) fell 4.8%. The Nasdaq had soared to all-time highs on each of the past...

New coronavirus cases still rising in more than 20 U.S. states U.S. stocks swooned Thursday as coronavirus cases continued to rise and investors digested Wednesday’s downbeat economic outlook from the Federal Reserve. The market moves came even as the number of Americans filing for jobless benefits for the first time continued to decline in the most recent week.

“The market has been a ray of sunshine — basically investors being convinced that we’ll get out of this, and the economy will recover along with earnings... The economy may very well be catching up with the stock market rather than the stock market going off on its own.“ That’s Edward Yardeni, president of Yardeni Research, explaining to CNBC why he believes the historic May jobs report will ultimately be a game-changer for Wall Street. In other words, he believes such a massive rebound in the employment number flies in the face of the popular notion that the rally is...

The stock market rallied once again on Monday, pushing the S&P 500 into the green for the year as the benchmark completed its wild round trip amid the coronavirus pandemic. Investors are growing more and more optimistic about a speedy economic recovery as states continue to reopen. Stocks finished the day at their session highs with the S&P 500 jumping 1.2%, or 38.46 points, to 3,232.39. The equity benchmark turned positive for the year in the final moments of Monday and has now bounced more than 47% off its March low. At one point this year, the S&P 500 was...

Just when it seemed as though America may be turning the corner after months of lockdown… just when it seemed as though we were on a path to reopening and gradually returning to normalcy… just when the prospects of panic-induced social unrest seemed to be behind us… …America’s cities erupted into flames. Antifa and BLM-organized rioting, looting, violence, and mayhem have pushed cities across the country into pandemonium. Even if the insurrections are soon quelled – as President Donald Trump promised to do in a speech in front of the White House on Monday – the consequences won’t soon go...

For those of us who had faith in the economy and Donald Trump, and who therefore stayed in the stock market, it looks as if our loyalty is being rewarded. The stock market is rising, something it did even before the stellar employment numbers came out today. The usual doom-and-gloomers on the left are trying to downplay what’s happening as a short burst of irrational exuberance that reality will quickly temper. The parable of the ox says the naysayers are wrong. The news from the stock market and the labor market shows that the U.S. economy is rapidly rebounding:...

CNN opted not to air President Trump's remarks on Friday's surprise jobs report showing 2.5 million jobs were added to the economy in May, with MSNBC carrying the comments partially, and Fox News, ABC, NBC and CBS carrying the speech from the Rose Garden in full. The president was in a celebratory mood following the report that the unemployment rate dropped from 14.7 percent in April to 13.3 percent in May. Analysts had expected the report would show unemployment rising to as high as 20 percent, and the new figures suggested an economic rebound could come more quickly. Stocks jumped...

The Washington Post was blasted on social media after it jumped the gun with an inaccurate tweet Friday claiming the May U.S. unemployment rate was close to 20 percent, moments after the actual report indicated the rate unexpectedly had dropped to 13.3 percent. “Grim milestone to be reached as May unemployment rate nears 20 percent,” the Post wrote in a now-deleted tweet to accompany a now-edited story with the same inaccurate headline. May’s 13.3 is significantly down from a record high in April, indicating the nation's economy is recovering faster than expected from the coronavirus lockdown – but it appears...

Stocks rose sharply Friday after the U.S. May jobs report showed a surprise 2.5 million jump in payrolls and a drop in the unemployment rate to 13.3% as businesses began to reopen from the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns. How are benchmarks performing? The Dow Jones Industrial Average US:DJIA jumped 950 points, or 3.6%, to 27,226, while the S&P 500 US:SPX rose 88 points, or 2.9%, to 3,201. The Nasdaq Composite US:COMP advanced 191 points, or 2%, to 9,807 and was briefly trading above its record closing level of 9,817.18 set on Feb. 19. The Nadaq-100 US:NDX , meanwhile, rose 171 points,...

Stocks rose sharply Friday after the U.S. May jobs report showed a surprise 2.5 million jump in payrolls and a drop in the unemployment rate to 13.3% as businesses began to reopen from the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns. How are benchmarks performing? The Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, +3.16% jumped 692.87 points, or 2.6%, to 26,974.69, while the S&P 500 SPX, +2.53% rose 68.63 points, or 2.2%, to 3,180.98. The Nasdaq Composite COMP, +1.88% advanced 160.03 points, or 1.7%, to 9,775.85. On Thursday, the Dow ended 11.93 points, or less than 0.1%, higher at 26,281.82. The fourth straight gain matches a...

Nonfarm payrolls rose by 2.5 million in May and the unemployment rate fell to 13.3%. Wall Street estimates had been for a decline of 8.3 million and a jobless level of 19.5%, which would have been the worst since the Great Depression era. Much of the gain came from those classified as temporary layoffs due to the coronavirus-related economic shutdown. Leisure and hospitality represented almost half the jobs gained. Employment stunningly rose by 2.5 million in May and the jobless rate declined to 13.3%, according to data Friday from the Labor Department that was far better than economists had...

President Donald Trump took a victory lap on news of a 13.3% US unemployment rate Friday, announcing in a tweet he would be holding a surprise news conference at 10:00 a.m.

President Trump holds a Press Conference on 6/5/2020 at 10AM EDT. Links below. https://www.whitehouse.gov/live/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uFCvKNOU8Hg&feature=youtu.be

Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now. Another day, another rally for the stock market, this time buoyed by some actual good news. The stock market’s rally in recent weeks has felt awfully disconnected from the grim reality on the ground. And that only felt more true as protests erupted around the country following the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis policeman. Investors, however, are motivated by fear and greed, and right now both are helping—fear of missing out and greed as the market goes higher. That’s especially true after the bleakness was interrupted by some better economic news—the ADP payrolls...