02 March 2009 Daily comment

Another day, another flop.

• The Dow and S&P decisively went through their technical support of 2002 and  November 2009 in a follow-through of Friday, led by banking, energy and resources stocks; we are back to 1997. What’s next? Since market participants are expecting a disastrous nonfarm payrolls number, the market should rebound short term by the end of the week. Today’s ISM manufacturing better than expected number had no effect on the markets (Bloomberg).
• Commodities took a bath today, the CRB index down over 5% and at its short term support at 200.
• Energy sharply down at 10%  with the WTI flirting with $ 40 a barrel on the April 09 futures.
• Precious metals not a safe-haven these days with gold down $22.50 (-2.3%) at $926.5, silver and platinum more resilient at $12.93 and $ 1,058 (-1.4%). Gold is nearly oversold short term.
• OIS and TED spread steady at 1%. Yields in Europe and the US tightening along the yield curve.
• And again… $30 billion provided by the US government Monday to plug a record Q4 2008 $ 61.7 billion loss. Well, now we are at $ 180 billion of State money for AIG alone.