Stock Market Update -Jun 7th

The market was up nicely this week, finally surpassing the previous peak seen in early January (see chart below). The payroll report on Friday was much better than expected as far as job losses, though the unemployment rate is now up to 9.4%, the highest in 25 years.

GM filed for bankruptcy on Monday, with the government now owning 60% of the company as part of a restructuring plan.

New Unemployment claims for the week came in over 600,000 again, and another bank was shut down by regulators (list).

Commodities: Oil prices continued to rise, closing around $68 per barrel. Gold prices fell to $960, as the US Dollar turned up this week. Bond prices continued its steep drop in prices (higher long term interest rates!).


GM and Citigroup were removed from the DOW index, and replaced by Cisco and Travelers.

Market analysis: Still no clear short-term direction at this point -we could see a continuation of last week's up-trend, though many 'traders' are looking for a reversal at this point.

G.M. Files for Bankruptcy
40,000 Jobs Lost as GM Becomes Biggest Ever U.S. Company Failure
The Quagmire Ahead
Will Government Motors do better than General Motors?
Who Is Going To Lend Us The Money To Fund Our Exploding Debt?
Our Exploding Deficit Will Kill The Economy

Why Cisco got the Dow-index slot over other tech ideas
Microsoft's Great Week
Countrywide's Mozilo accused of fraud
Rising interest rates could threaten recovery
Doubts about three-month rally dog Wall Street