Not a lot to comment on today from a macro point of view, as you know if you've been watching the markets today. The president of the EU central bank, Trichet did make comments today indicating he was going to maintain interest rates at six decade lows for awhile. With U.S. rates higher now and the Fed continuing to tighten, the dollar and gold were the big movers. The ECU fell .74 and gold fell $4.40. Nothing else moved.
On the economic front, chain store sales were good at 3.6% vs 2.7%. Jobless claims were down to 316m vs 327m. These good numbers were countered somewhat by factory orders coming in at .3% vs .5% consensus and the non-manufacturing ISM at 59.2 vs last months 63.9.
Tommorrow we get the jobs number and I must be the only one on the planet that thinks if payrolls show a really large increase that it won't be good for stocks. To me it means higher unit labor cost, lower profit margins and faster Fed tightening.
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