A Week in the Rearview – week ending 1/23/09
In the headlines
A look at some of the market movers over the past week:
- Amidst a deepening recession and financial turmoil, Barack Obama was sworn in as the 44th President of the United States
- Chrysler and Fiat entered into an agreement which gave Fiat a 35% stake in the troubled US automaker
- The New York Times received a $250 million loan from Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim Helu
- Mining giant BHP Billiton announced 6,000 job cuts and the closure of an Australian nickel mine
- IBM managed to fight off the tech slump and provide better than expected earnings results
- The SEC has opened a probe into Apple’s disclosures about Steve Jobs’ health problems, but that didn’t dampen enthusiasm over better than expected earnings
- Citigroup declared a one penny dividend, as required under the terms of the government’s bailout of the bank
- Shareholders are suing Bank of America over the deal to buy struggling Merrill Lynch
- Sony announced that it will see a significant loss when it next reports earnings
- A mega-deal could be brewing in the pharma space as rumors are circling that Pfizer is looking to buy rival Wyeth
- GE announced a 44% drop in quarterly profit for the fourth quarter
- Bank of America said goodbye to former Merrill Lynch CEO John Thain
- Google earnings shrugged off the slump and beat Wall Street estimates, though Microsoft couldn’t manage the same
- The Senate approved Mary Schapiro as the new head of the SEC
- Treasury secretary nominee Tim Geithner suggested that China is manipulating its currency
Commentary
It was a shortened week, but there was no shortage of action. Unfortunately, much of that action was to the downside, which sent the S&P 500 index tumbling over 5% on the first trading day of the week, and kept it down 2.1% for the whole week.
History was written at the front end of the week, with Barack Obama getting inaugurated as the 44th President of the United States. That, however, wasn’t able to blunt the growing concerns over the ability of the government to stem the growing losses at US banks, and stock market indexes tumbled as Obama officially took office.
The focus for much of the rest of the week stayed the same, with investors becoming increasingly worried about the troubles not only at US banks, but banks around the globe. At the same time a stream of earnings reports hit the newswires during the week, most of which not only showed lower earnings, but also dim forecasts of the coming quarters. Though there were a few bright spots such as Apple and IBM in the mix, they were unable to steal the show from laggards like Microsoft and GE.
Economic news was light during the week, but yet higher initial claims for unemployment, along with a drop in housing starts and building permits added to the dour sentiment.
Looking ahead
We have a full five day week ahead of us and we’re going to need every bit of it to digest the wave of news that’s coming our way. On the economic side, the week will be peppered by releases of interest such as consumer confidence, the CaseShiller home price index, initial unemployment claims, new home sales, and the Chicago purchasing managers index. The week will be punctuated, though, with the Federal Reserve’s rate decision on Wednesday and an advanced reading on fourth quarter GDP on Friday.
According to future contracts tracked by the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, the market is expecting that the Fed will continue to target a Federal Funds Rate range of 0% to 0.25%. While the decision on the rate level itself will be important, equally important will be the commentary about the economy that the Fed will provide with its decision.
Earnings will come fast and furious during the week, starting from the very first day of the week. Monday will bring Amgen, American Express, Caterpillar, Halliburton, McDonalds, Texas Instruments, and Wyeth — among many others — to the fore. On Tuesday and Wednesday we’ll hear from EMC, Stryker, Sun Microsystems, Hershey, US Steel, Verizon, Yahoo!, AT&T, ConocoPhillips, Pfizer, Qualcomm, SAP, Starbucks, Symantec, Boeing, and Wells Fargo. It will be no slower on Thursday and Friday with highlights including 3M, Altria, Amazon.com, Colgate-Palmolive, Continental Airlines, Eli Lilly, Ford, JetBlue, Raytheon, Sony, US Airways, Chevron, Exxon, Honda, Honeywell, and Procter & Gamble.
As the above run-down shows, a host of industries will be represented in the earnings reports. Banking, however, may take a main stage — as it has so often lately — as many smaller regional banks will be reporting earnings.
Investors should expect a bumpy ride in the upcoming week. Not only is volatility the rule on the equity markets right now, but it’s tough to anticipate that much of the news we’ll see next week will be positive. There may be a few positive earnings reports, but those will most likely be seen as company specific and not something that can be applied more broadly to the economy or market. Meanwhile, the economic reports will most likely engender negative sentiment, even if they don’t come in below expectations, and the comments from the Fed will probably focus on the dire state of the economy.
As always, though, the movements of the market during the week will depend more on investors’ perceptions of the future and the extent to which stock are already priced for the current bad news. While the big picture may seem desperately far off during such trying times, we believe it still to be in investors’ best interests to rely on longer time horizons for their returns than the six-month to one-year periods that Wall Street and most news media tent to focus on.
