Stocks Sink Steeply, Time Warner Writedown, Oil Dips

  • January 7, 2009
  • David Goodboy

Stocks Sink Steeply, Time Warner Writedown, Oil Dips

Positive New Year feelings were quickly erased today as stocks descend steeply on higher than expected jobless numbers and earnings warnings. Good news for consumers of higher oil inventories pushed crude lower while gold fell dramatically. The DJIA gave back -245.40 to 8769.70, the Nasdaq dropped -53.32 to 1599.06 and the broad based S&P 500 fell -28.05 to 906.65.

Time Warner
(
TWX |
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Chart |
News |
PowerRating) – Fell 6.28% or 0.69 cents to $10.29/share after announcing its first loss in 6 years and a $25 billion dollar write down of AOL, publishing and cable systems.

Aetna
(
AET |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) – Goldman Sachs added this insurer to its conviction sell list resulting in the stock dipping 3.92% or $1.19 to $29.17/share.

Arbitron
(
ARB |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) – Climbed 14.82% or $2.11 to $16.35/share after settling a racial bias suit.

Harley-Davidson
(
HOG |
Quote |
Chart |
News |
PowerRating) – The iconic American motorcycle brand fell 12.53% or $2.48 to $17.32/share after Raymond James cut its rating to underperform.

Oil fell $5.95 to $42.78, gold plummeted $24.30 to $841.70 and the VIX fear index rocketed up 12.53% to 43.39.

Market Snapshot

Dow

 -245.40 8,769.70

NASDAQ

 -53.32 1599.06

S&P 500

 -28.05 906.65

Economic
News

Construction Spending (Nov): Consensus -1.2%, Prior -1.2%

Auto Sales (Dec): Consensus NA, Prior 3.3M

Truck Sales (Dec): Consensus NA, Prior 4.3M

Factory Orders (Nov): Consensus -2.6%, Prior -5.1%

ISM Services (Dec): Consensus 37.0, Prior 37.3

Crude Inventories (Jan 02): Consensus NA, Prior NA

Initial Claims (Jan 03): Consensus 550K, Prior 492K

Consumer Credit (Nov): Consensus$0.5B, Prior -$3.5B

Average Worksheet (Dec): Consensus 33.5, Prior 33.5

Hourly Earnings (Dec): Consensus 0.2%, Prior 0.4%

Nonfarm Payrolls (Dec): Consensus -475K, Prior -533K

Unemployment Rate (Dec): Consensus 7.0%, Prior 6.7%

Wholesale Inventories (Nov): Consensus -0.9%, Prior -1.1%