Wednesday’s Market Recap: Stocks Up Despite Dismal Fed Report

Wall Street found its way into the green after an interesting day of news. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) rose 2%, to close at 8,591 points. The Nasdaq (^IXIC) gained almost 3%, to 1,492 points. The S&P (^GSPC) also gained 2.5% and closed at 870 points. The market has closed in the green seven days out of the past eight sessions. Markets finished higher in spite of a report from the fed that the economy is heading deeper into a recession as the holiday season draws closer. In international trading Britain’s FTSE 100 (^FTSE) was up 1.4% and Japan’s Nikkei 225 gained 1.79%.

The price of a barrel of Crude Oil went down 17 cents to $46.79 on the NYMEX. Gasoline future fell to $1.04, and heating oil went up to $1.58. Natural gas dropped 7 cents and settled at $6.35.

The 10-year Treasury note yield fell 3%, raising its price. The price of the three month T-bill also rose as its yield dropped to 0.01% from 0.05%.

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson is considering a plan to lower mortgage rates and revive the housing sector by speeding up the treasury program of buying mortgage-backed securities. Paulson is also deciding about asking congress for the remainder of the $700 billion Troubled Relief Asset Program (TARP).

The world’s leading e-commerce company Amazon (AMZN) saw a strong rise in share price today, but that didn’t stop Citigroup (C) from cutting sales estimates. Citi analyst Mark Mahoney cut sales growth down to 7% from 16%, reasoning that the holiday season will be very tough for internet businesses.

SanDisk (SNDK) enjoyed the biggest rise in the S&P 500, after news that Toshiba Corp. was interested in buying the company.

Shares of Morgan Stanley (MS) ended higher despite some predictions of losses in the fourth quarter by analysts from other banks.

Disclosure: None

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