Okay for Now

ECB rate action and favorable U.S. employment data led markets higher across Europe and North America Thursday. Mario Draghi vowed to be at the ready to address deepening recession in Europe if need be, for whatever that is worth. In the U.S., both jobless claims and announced corporate layoffs came in favorably. However, Friday offers the monthly Employment Situation Report, which will dictate much about Friday’s trade and beyond. But, the real unemployment rate is what matters. We will be letting investors know once again just what that is, so stay tuned to our stock market blog.

Overseas Markets

EUROPE	CLOSE	ASIA/PACIFIC	CLOSE
EURO STOXX 50	+0.3%	NIKKEI 225	-0.8%
German DAX	+0.6%	Hang Seng	-0.3%
CAC 40	+0.1%	S&P/ASX 200	-0.7%
FTSE 100	+0.2%	Korean KOSPI	-0.3%
Greek ASE	+1.0%	BSE India SENSEX	+1.2%

The European Central Bank cut interest rates in response to deteriorating euro-zone economies. In his follow up press conference, ECB Chief Mario Draghi said the ECB was ready to act if need be, regarding fighting a recession. Well, if that is the case, the ECB should be acting today, because Europe is in a deep recession as far as I can tell. I suppose the ECB will act at some later date, when the EU economies are in depression, like Greece. The iShares S&P Europe 350 Index (NYSE: IEV) started the day lower, but ended up a half point by some hallucination.

Economic Events

The Challenger Job-Cut Report of announced corporate layoffs showed 38,121 in April, down from the 49,255 reported in March and 55,356 of them in February. While some said this was good news, I’ll have to remind investors that this is a lagging indicator and will be bad after the fact (implying recession).

Weekly Initial Jobless Claims covering the period ending April 27 showed weekly claims decreased by 18K, to 324K. Economists expected claims to rise to 345K. The four-week moving average for claims declined by 16,000, falling to 342,250. Each of these two data points lends to investor enthusiasm about Friday’s Employment Situation Report, and was largely behind the SPDR Dow Jones Industrial Average (NYSE: DIA) gain of 0.8% Thursday.

Nonfarm Productivity and Costs data was reported for the first quarter Thursday. Productivity increased by just 0.7%, against economist expectations for a 1.3% gain. Unit Labor Costs rose by 0.5%, against expectations for an increase of 0.1%.

The International Trade Report for the month of March showed the trade deficit contracted sharply to $38.8 billion, versus expectations for $42.4 billion; the contraction was from $43.6 billion the month before. In March, exports declined by 0.9% while imports dropped by 2.8%. Both export and import activity has dulled since recovering post the crisis and recession.

The Bloomberg Consumer Comfort Index, a weekly measure of the consumer mood, improved by 1.0 point, reaching a mark of -28.9. I continue to expect the index to revisit lower levels before long. Consumers are not generally in a good mood today, as was evidenced by the recent drops seen in the Conference Board and University of Michigan monthly measures.

Commodity Markets (CLOSE of Trading)

WTI Crude	-0.0%
Brent Crude	+2.9%
RBOB Gasoline	-0.2%
NYMEX Natural Gas	+0.5%
Gold Spot	-0.0%
Silver Spot	-0.1%
COMEX Copper	+0.9%
CBOT Corn	+2.4%
CBOT Wheat	+1.0%
CBOT Soybeans	-0.1%
ICE Sugar	+1.6%
ICE Cocoa	-0.0%
ICE Orange Juice Conc.	+3.0%
CME Live Cattle	-0.0%

The EIA’s Natural Gas Report covering the period ending April 26 showed working gas in storage increased by 43 Bcf. Stocks were 795 Bcf less than last year at this time and 118 Bcf below the five-year average for this time of year.

Corporate Events

There were investor meetings at Dish Network (Nasdaq: DISH), DuPont (NYSE: DD) and Strayer Education (Nasdaq: STRA). The EPS slate highlighted presentations by LinkedIn (Nasdaq: LNKD), American International Group (NYSE: AIG), Cardinal Health (NYSE: CAH), International Paper (NYSE: IP), Marsh & McLennan (NYSE: MMC), Becton Dickinson (NYSE: BDX), Cigna (NYSE: CI), Actavis (NYSE: ACT), Airgas (NYSE: ARG), Ameren (NYSE: AEE), Beam (Nasdaq: BEAM), CenterPoint Energy (NYSE: CNP), CME Group (NYSE: CME), Denbury Resources (NYSE: DNR), Dun & Bradstreet (NYSE: DNB), Estee Lauder (NYSE: EL), Fluor (NYSE: FLR), Gilead Sciences (Nasdaq: GILD), Harman Int’l (NYSE: HAR), Kellogg (NYSE: K), Kraft Foods (Nasdaq: KRFT), Microchip Technology (Nasdaq: MCHP), Mylan (NYSE: MYL), Northeast Utilities (NYSE: NU), PG&E (NYSE: PCG), PPL Corp. (NYSE: PPL), Quanta Services (NYSE: PWR), Scripps Networks (NYSE: SNI), Sempra Energy (NYSE: SRE), Southwestern Energy (NYSE: SWN), Teradata (NYSE: TDC), Vulcan Materials (NYSE: VMC), WPX Energy (NYSE: WPX), Xcel Energy (NYSE: XEL), XL Group (NYSE: XL), ZAGG (Nasdaq: ZAGG) and more.

Please see our disclosures at the Wall Street Greek website and author bio pages found there. This article and website in no way offers or represents financial or investment advice. Information is provided for entertainment purposes only.