Wall Street ends up on recovery expectation

For this last full day of trading for 2020 we saw the Dow inching to a new record with investor optimism about the outlook for 2021 which, put another way, means it’s got to be better than 2020.  A bigger stimulus pretty much got nixed by McConnell today but as today’s expert put it, “Something’s better than nothing but there’s a lot of politics involved.” That’s really a glass half-full attitude but the real issue now is the Georgia run-off on January 5^th.  So the Dow was up 74 points and the S&P is coming into year-end 15.5% up on the year.  For the final week of the year trading is of course subdued with volume below the 4-week average at just under 9.6 billion.   

Wall St dips from record levels, additional stimulus uncertain

Everything was going swimmingly until about noon with the Dow and other indexes all hitting intraday record highs.  Then McConnell announced that there would be no immediate consideration of increased stimulus payments and that sent everything crashing down for all the indexes to close with modest losses, the Dow down 68 points. To be fair, he’s not killing it, simply postponing it to include the debate on other issues including big tech and election integrity. But his failure to endorse sent the markets from green to red.  The S&P will close the year 15.4% up if the two remaining trading days hold no major surprises and volume will continue to be light compared to recent averages, as it was today at just under 9.5 billion. 

Wall Street climbs to record as fiscal aid bill signed

Trump’s late night signing of the relief bill sent the markets way up again (who says this stuff is already priced in?), the Dow soaring 204 points.  The Democrats wasted no time putting together a package for higher relief payments but it’s doubtful it’ll get past the Senate. The S&P is well positioned  to finish the year up 15 percent despite substantial worrisome headwinds which may prove problematic in 2021.  Volume for this final week will be thin and indeed came in today below the 4-week average at 9.9 billion. 

Succinct Summation of Week’s Events 12.25.20 (plus the federal budget)

Below please find the usual weekly summation, this week being abbreviated due to the holidays. Nonetheless, the positives and negatives have remained mostly unchanged, the main positive being the distribution of the vaccine, this week going to 3.3 million Americans. The main negative besides being another terrible pandemic week with more than 3,000 deaths daily is the president creating more chaos in vetoing the relief  bill.  (As of Sunday night, the news is he has now signed the bill!) 

The Beatles Sneak Peek

Hey, it's Christmas!  Let's have one day when we're just having fun and not talking finance. In that spirit, here is today's post from Barry Ritholtz's Big Picture blog.  Enjoy. 

Lifetime Learning - a special Christmas gift from WealthTrack

Merry Christmas to one and all and very befitting for this holiday is a special gift from Consuelo Mack at PBS's WealthTrack, her program this week being with Charley Ellis and his books on lifetime lessons in investing. He has taught investing for years at Yale, Harvard, and Princeton. Who needs an Ivy League degree when you have WealthTrack? Enjoy the program. Enjoy the books. And enjoy the holiday, stay well!  

Wall Street closes with a modest gains on Brexit deal, stimulus hopes

The markets closed modestly higher with hopes pinned to an imminent stimulus agreement and brighter days from the vaccine rollout. The UK completing the Brexit today also boosted optimism. Due to the shortened holiday week and a shortened trading day for Christmas Eve, volume was about half the usual at about 6.1 billion.