To: Gottfried who wrote (78933 ) 2/8/2018 6:39:43 PM From: Return to Sender 1 RecommendationRecommended By
Respond to Wall Street Tumbles For Fifth Time In Six SessionsDow -1032.89 at 23860.46, Nasdaq -274.82 at 6777.16, S&P -100.66 at 2581.00briefing.com Budding angst surrounding the reported two-year budget agreement in the Senate, which fueled concerns about the level of the budget deficit and national debt. The 10-yr yield hit 2.88% today but settled up just one basis point at 2.85% for the session as the deficit concerns stood in the way of safe-haven flows related to the stock market losses. The lack of key sector leadership. The financial (-4.5%), information technology (-4.2%), and consumer discretionary (-4.0%) sectors were today's biggest laggards. Comments from Fed heads, who continue to emphasize a likely path of gradual rate hikes and who have minimized recent market volatility. That understanding provoked concerns about a possible policy mistake by the Fed, which was registered in the underperformance of the cyclical sectors today; and Following the trend of the tape, which has been biased downward at a time when many participants have been hoping for a rebound. The continued downward bias shook out "weak-handed longs" who have been aiming to profit from a buy-the-dip trade. Their selling presumably exacerbated today's losses. Twitter (TWTR 30.18, +3.27) spiked 12.2% to its best level since mid-2015 after reporting better-than-expected earnings and revenues and achieving GAAP profitability for the first time ever. Meanwhile, Tesla (TSLA 315.23, -29.77) dropped 8.6% despite reporting above-consensus earnings and saying that it's on track to meet its goal of producing 5,000 Model 3 cars per week by the end of June.The latest weekly initial jobless claims count totaled 221,000, while the Briefing.com consensus expected a reading of 234,000. Today's tally was below the unrevised prior week count of 230,000. As for continuing claims, they declined to 1.923 million from a revised count of 1.956 million (from 1.953 million). The key takeaway from the initial claims report is that it provides a basis to keep the Treasury market on edge about future rate hikes.
