You mean you simply want to go against me?

    It will be yourself you are going against..

         hehe 

Hulumas      ( Date: 28-Sep-2010 19:37) Posted: Since you say so, I start selling tomorrow then. iPunter      ( Date: 28-Sep-2010 19:23) Posted: But I think the market will most probably continue to climb a wall of worry...

PRC USA trade war is unavoidable, I suppose . . . . so how?

iPunter      ( Date: 23-Sep-2010 07:59) Posted: Looking at the term chart,    the Dow is still at a resilient stage..    The nominal fall should not be viewed as 'slump'..

Stocks drop from 4-month highs

The Dow Jones industrial average (INDU) slipped 48 points, or 0.4%, the S&P 500 (SPX) ticked down 6.5 points, or 0.6%, and the Nasdaq (COMP) lost 11 points, or 0.5%.

Wall Street has been on a nice tear lately, as economic readings have started convincing investors that the recovery is gaining ground. U.S. stocks soared to their highest levels in four months Friday, and are still poised to end September with the biggest monthly gains in more than a year.

"The tone of economic news has gotten significantly stronger over the last four to six weeks," said Phil Orlando, chief equity strategist at Federated Investors. "This has provided investors with greater confidence that what we experienced over the summer months was simply an economic soft patch rather than the start of a double-dip recession."

With little on the economic calendar Monday, investors are soaking in the advances from the previous week and focusing on deals announced by Southwest Airlines, Wal-Mart and Unilever.

"We do have a very aggressive [merger and acquisition] cycle, and that's good for the market," he said. "But the market doesn't go up 2% every day, so right now we're just nursing a hangover."

Economy: As the market nurses its hangover, there's still plenty for investors to worry about, said Joseph Saluzzi, co-head of equity trading at Themis Trading.

With the government's seizure of three credit unions on Friday and Moody's downgrade of Anglo Irish Bank on Monday, the health of global financial institutions remains a huge concern, he said.

"The government bailing out those credit unions shows that toxic assets are still on the books, there are still things being hidden and nobody know's what's going on," he said. "And the concern about European sovereign debt is tremendous -- all those countries are connected, so if one is required to be bailed out, it's going to affect everyone else."

And while declines were generally broad-based Monday, financial stocks took a hit, with industry leaders JPMorgan Chase (JPM, Fortune 500) and Bank of America (BAC, Fortune 500) sliding more than 1%.

"People have been thinking it's all fixed but we've still got a long way to go," Saluzzi said.

Painfully high unemployment, home prices and the government's enormous deficit are other issues still weighing on the minds of investors, he said.

Companies: Southwest Airlines (LUV, Fortune 500) announced a $1.4 billion offer for AirTran Holdings (AAI), the parent company of AirTran Airways. The bid amounts to a 69% premium over AirTran's Friday closing price. The announcement sent AirTran stock surging 61%, while shares of Southwest rose 9%.

Shares of Wal-Mart (WMT, Fortune 500) slipped 1% after the company bid to acquire Johannesburg-based retailer Massmart Holdings Limited for roughly $4 billion. Massmart operates 290 stores in 13 countries in Africa. A deal has not yet been agreed to.

Consumer goods giant Unilever said it is buying Alberto Culver (ACV), manufacturer of the Tresemme and Noxzema brands, for $3.7 billion. Shares of Alberto Culver jumped 20%, while Unilever (UN) shares edged up 1%.

While deal-making activity tends to boost the market, Saluzzi said that the recent flurry of mergers and acquisitions should make investors wary.

"[Mergers and acquisitions] are destroyers of jobs, not creators of jobs," he said. "So I don't buy it that these are a good thing."

Meanwhile, Progress Energy (PGN, Fortune 500) tripped a circuit breaker, causing trading of the energy company to pause for five minutes after shares briefly plunged 90%.

After the market close, BlackBerry maker Research in Motion (RIMM) announced plans for PlayBook, a new tablet computer to compete with Apple's iPad. Shares of the company jumped more than 1% in after-hours trading.

World markets: European stocks ended lower. Britain's FTSE 100 fell 0.5%, Germany's DAX slid 0.3% and France's CAC 40 dropped 0.4%.

Currencies and commodities: The dollar rose against the euro and the Japanese yen, but fell versus the British pound.

The price of oil for November delivery edged up 3 cents to settle at $76.52 per barrel.

Gold futures for December delivery surged to a new record, settling at $1,298.60 an ounce. On Friday, gold hit a new intra-day record of $1,301.60.

Bonds: The yield on the 10-year Treasury note fell to 2.53% from 2.61% late Tuesday. 

STI opens higher

STI higher at midday

Stocks end with a late-stage slide

Stocks slump, gold surges

Stocks poised for early pop

Stocks rally to 4-month highs

The Dow Jones industrial average (INDU) gained 146 points, or 1.4%, to end at 10,753, its highest close since mid-May. The tech-heavy Nasdaq (COMP) rallied 40 points, or 1.7%, to finish at 2,355.

The S&P 500 (SPX) added 17 points, or 1.5%, to close at 1,142. The index crossed 1,130, a key technical level watched closely by analysts, early in the session and continued to surge in the afternoon to cross the next short-term technical level of 1,140.

"The S&P has tried to sit above the 1,130 level in June, August and last week but failed, so the fact that it has broken up above that point and is staying there is considered a positive sign for the bulls and forcing traders to come back in," said Donald Selkin, chief market strategist at National Securities.

Trading has been choppy on Wall Street recently as investors look for solid signs pointing to a sustained recovery.

Buying picked up steam Monday after the National Bureau of Economic Research, the independent body of economists in charge of dating when recessions begin and end, announced that the 18-month Great Recession officially ended in June 2009.

"I think it was known that the recession ended then, but maybe the official announcement gives people some needed assurance," said Selkin.

Meanwhile, investors also took in a housing report showing homebuilder confidence is stuck at an 18-month low.

Economy: A report from the National Association of Home Builders -- the first of a number of readings on the housing market due out this week -- showed builder confidence for newly built single-family homes remained steady in September, after falling for three consecutive months.

The NAHB's Housing Market Index was unchanged at 13. Economists surveyed by Briefing.com were expecting builder sentiment index to edge up to 14.

Data on housing starts and building permits in August come out Tuesday, while reports on new and existing home sales are slated for release later in the week.

Fed: Investors will also be watching the Federal Reserve's announcement on interest rate policy Tuesday. The central bank is widely expected to hold rates steady, but investors will parse the Fed's policy statement for clues on the economic outlook.

Companies: Against the backdrop of housing data due out this week, two major homebuilders are also releasing their latest earnings reports.

Lennar (LEN) reported $825 million in revenue -- a 14% rise over the year-earlier quarter. Profit was $30 million, or 16 cents per share, well above analysts' forecasts of 4 cents per share on $760.2 million in revenue. Shares of Lennar rose 8.2%.

Rival homebuilder KB Home (KBH) will report earnings on Friday.

IBM (IBM, Fortune 500) announced Monday that it plans to acquire data storage company Netezza (NZ) for $27 per share, or about $1.7 billion. Netezza shares rose 15%.

In another tech merger, shares of Nu Horizons Electronics (NUHC) more than doubled to $6.90 on news that Arrow Electronics (ARW, Fortune 500) will buy the company for $7 a share.

Verizon Communications (VZ, Fortune 500) named Lowell McAdam as its president and chief operating officer, putting him second in line to Chairman and CEO Ivan G. Seidenberg. Shares were up 1.3%.

BP (BP) announced Sunday that its Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico has been cemented shut and is "effectively dead." The well ruptured 5 months ago, causing the worst oil spill in U.S. history. BP's stock rose about 1.7%.

Spirit Airlines filed for an initial public offering with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

World markets: European shares closed with strong gains. Britain's FTSE 100 jumped 1.7%, the CAC 40 in France rose 1.8%, and Germany's DAX added 1.4%.

In Asia, the Hang Seng ended modestly higher, while the Shanghai Composite edged lower. Japanese markets were closed for a holiday.

Currencies and commodities: The dollar fell against the euro and the Japanese yen, but rose slightly against Britain's pound.

Oil futures for October delivery gained $1.20 to settle at $74.86 a barrel. The October contract is slated to expire at the end of trade Tuesday, with volume already picking up in the November contract.

Gold for December delivery rose $3.30 to settle at an all-time high of $1,280.80 an ounce. Earlier, it hit an intra-day high of $1,285.20 an ounce.

Bonds: The price on the 10-year Treasury note was slightly higher, pushing down the yield to 2.71% from 2.75% late Friday.