Stronger than expected Durable Goods Report for March. 3.4% vs 0.7% consensus. Meanwhile, the February DG Report was revised upward from 2.5% to 3.8%. In otherwords, the Economy is BOOMING! From Dow Jones News Services: The March durable-goods report showed the increase was fairly broad-based with gains in all categories except civilian aircraft orders, cars and primary metals. A 132.7% jump in defense aircraft orders pushed overall transportation orders up by 2.4% in March. This offset a 1.1% decline in orders for cars and parts and a 12.6% drop in civilian aircraft orders. If transportation orders are excluded, durable-goods orders would have risen by 1.8% for the month. Defense capital goods orders rose by 16.1% in March. If defense orders are excluded from overall durable-goods orders, orders would have increased by 1.3%. The report suggests that businesses started spending again in March as the war with Iraq appeared to be moving toward a successful conclusion. Orders for computers and electronic products rose by 4.0% and orders for nondefense capital goods - which are items meant to last 10 years or more - gained 3.2% if orders for aircraft are excluded.
THe fact that u are hyping up the economy is a good contrarian sell signal to dump stocks like MMM. Reminds me of your last post when u hyped the metals like PD. http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=27872&perpage=6&pagenumber=1 When people like u start to hype things up thats usually a good contrarian signal.. the only time it doesnt work is when we enter a speculative bubble phase. Then u can just throw everything out the window.. but that also is the riskiest time to play any direction. Wow pockets of the economy are doing well. Yippy.. all throughout these great earnings and amazing eco. data the S&P absolutely did nothing but chop around in a range. The market was supposed to rally and right now should be hitting new highs in new bull leg.. the reality is the market is starting to look ahead.. and although next quarter earnings will probably look good (yay rah rah).. in the next 6-12 months thing will be a hell of a lot more difficult and earnings for financials (which compromise the majority of S&P) probably peaked. --MIKE