Friday the futures took a dump right after the Nonfarm payroll report because the report was truly ugly. But as usual, bad news was good for the market. We ended up for the day and week. After 2 down weeks the markets picked themselves up in a big way and….have ended up where we were 2 months ago. Gee, isn’t that exciting!
Unemployment was up to 10.2%, a rate not seen since 1983. Of course 10% in 2009 is a lot more unemployed than 10% in 1983! Jobs are not coming back soon…and some not at all.
Some other “good” news that must have fueled the bulls:
Buy a $15,000 Policy or Go to Jail
Consumer credit decreased in 3rd Qtr.
And remember, every Friday the FDIC closes some failing banks — There were 5 banks that the FDIC took over this weekend. The United Commercial Bank of San Francisco, CA became the 120th bank failure of 2009. It’s fun to break records…even when they’re bad news.
I was looking at some charts this weekend and the VIX caught my eye. We had a little spurt up in volatility, but has returned to where we were before the markets ran down 2 weeks ago. So we’ll need to see if this double-bottom shows the start of some up move.
The really next big excitment trading day is options expiration Friday, 2 weeks away. That will also coincide with the end of the President’s trip to China. Earnings season is winding down and there isn’t much in economic data coming out the next week. So…we may be stuck in a range here for several days if not weeks….unless of course some geo-political event takes place. 
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