President Barack Obama will speak today at the White House at 11:20 a.m. Washington time on steps he plans to make the U.S. government leaner, smarter and more consumer-friendly, a White House official said business card templates.
Everybody knows that January predicts the stock market’s direction for the year and that the best time to sell stocks is at their spring peak. And among stock market experts, it’s a sure bet that the market will soar in the year before an election.
But what passes for stock market wisdom is suspect when given a closer look. The most common error comes when people spot two events and assume that one causes the other.
And it drives economists, math geeks and plenty of money managers nuts.
“If you look at enough data in enough different ways, you’re going to find something that isn’t really true,” says Edward Keon, who leads a mathematics team at Prudential Financial.
The same seasonal patterns seem to pop up year after year. Some are valuable and some meaningless, Keon says _ like saying stocks tend to rise or fall depending on the month, the temperature in New York City or who wins the Super Bowl.
People “are simply being fooled by randomness,” says Burton Malkiel, professor of economics at Princeton University and author of the finance classic “A Random Walk Down Wall Street.”
Spend enough time digging through numbers and you’re bound to find some that always take the same path, he says. “But none can reliably predict the future.”
Here’s an examination of some of the oldest Wall Street aphorisms.
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The claim: As goes January, so goes the year.
The idea is that January works as a barometer for the stock market’s full-year performance: A strong first month often leads to a year of gains, and a weak one to a year of losses.
It comes from Yale Hirsch, father of the Stock Trader’s Almanac, and looks reliable. Since 1929, the calendar year has followed January’s lead 60 out of 83 times, according to Howard Silverblatt, senior index analyst at Standard & Poor’s. That’s a .723 batting average.
The suggestion that January somehow directs the course of the next 11 months is what irks economists and investors, including Dan Greenhaus, chief market strategist at the brokerage BTIG.
Expecting to hear praise for January’s forecasting powers, Greenhaus attacked the idea on his blog Jan. 2, the day before U.S. markets opened for 2012. He took the S&P 500 index’s returns since 1950, including dividends, and found that the four months following January also appeared to work magic. When April is down, the next 12 months return a negative 0.2 percent. When April is up, the S&P 500 returns 12.8 percent. It’s a similar story with February, March and April. But why?
“It’s true that if January is up, the year is up most of the time,” he says. “But if you look at any month, you’ll find the market tends to be up over the next 12 months. And the reason is very simple: the market tends to be up.”
The S&P 500 has climbed in three out of every four years since 1950. Pick nearly any month in which stocks rose and most of the time you’ll find that the year was headed in the same direction.
But what if stocks fall in January? It doesn’t mean the next 11 months will follow. Sometimes, the stock market starts the year in a hole and digs its way out. In 1992, the S&P 500 dropped 2 percent in January, then ended the year with a modest gain of 4.5 percent.
“If you’re starting in the hole, then the 12-month period is starting in the hole,” Greenhaus says. “That should be intuitive. Instead it gets treated as some sort of prognostication tool. It’s just what happens.”
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The claim: Sell in May and go away.
Like a flock of migrating birds, the stock market tends to travel south or north depending on the season. It rises through the winter months and falls late in the spring. Investors struggle through the summer until November rolls around and the market picks up again.
“Sell in May and go away” is a well-worn saying, but the numbers seem to back it up. Since 1990, the three months starting in July have been the worst quarter for the S&P 500. Last year, the S&P hit its peak on April 29, then hit bottom Oct. 3, right on cue.
Even many skeptics think “sell in May” probably has something going for it _ but they can only guess why.
“It’s harder to debunk this one,” says Nick Colas, chief market strategist at ConvergEx Group.
The flow of money into retirement plans and mutual funds may have something to do with it. Colas says databases that track cash moving into stock funds show patterns similar to the stock market trend: A strong start that evaporates as the year progresses.
In the first four months of 2011, Americans added $13 billion to U.S. stock funds, according to the Investment Company Institute. But they pulled $6.5 billion in May and then began withdrawing much more. By the end of the year, retail investors had pulled $131.8 billion out of U.S. stock funds.
Some tie the summer sluggishness to vacation season. Trading desks are thinly staffed in the weeks before Labor Day. Fewer traders means a drop in trading volume, which makes it easier for markets to take bigger swings, often down.
Here’s where that explanation falls short. Traders return to their desks after Labor Day in September and trading picks up. But for all major stock indexes, September is historically the worst month of the year. Since 1950, it’s the only month in which the stock market has fallen more than it has risen.
Consumer confidence in the U.S. rose last week to the highest level in more than five months and the pace of firings declined, showing an improving job market is bolstering the biggest part of the economy.
The Bloomberg Consumer Comfort Index (COMFCOMF) climbed to minus 44.8 in the period ended Dec. 31, the best reading since mid-July, from minus 47.5 the prior week. Applications for jobless benefits (INJCJC) decreased by 15,000 during the same time to 372,000, according to Labor Department figures.
A pickup in hiring will further lift Americans
It was pretty clear from the start that this week’s news that Saudi Arabia is buying 84 new F-15 fighters from The Boeing Co. would have a big impact on the St. Louis region.
Today, the Regional Chamber and Growth Association took a stab at counting just how big.
While the $30 billion deal is not expected to create any new jobs, it will prolong production of the F-15, which is largely built at Boeing’s plant in north county, by about five years, through 2020.
That production supports about 1,000 manufacturing jobs at Boeing, and contribute to nearly 4,000 more through local suppliers and spinoff activity, according to RCGA economist Ruth Sergenian. Those direct jobs generate $1.1 billion a year in wages and other economic activity, and the indirect impact is another roughly $1.8 billion.
It’s worth noting that these sort of estimates are notoriously rough, and that something else might well fill the void were Boeing’s F-15 production to go away. But, for now, it’s not, and 2.9 billion more dollars flowing through the region’s economy every year is a pretty good thing.
The lone holdout juror who prevented a Utah company from getting as much as $1.2 billion from one-time rival Microsoft Corp. for alleged antitrust violations says he’s at peace with his decision.
Corbyn Alvey, a 21-year-old security guard from Magna, told KSL-TV ( http://bit.ly/ubPwcB) that he didn’t think there was enough evidence presented during the two-month trial in U.S. District Court in Salt Lake City to support the claims of Provo-based Novell Inc.
Novell sued Microsoft in 2004, claiming the software giant duped it into developing the once-popular WordPerfect writing program for Windows 95 only to pull the plug so Microsoft could gain market share with its own product. Novell says it was later forced to sell WordPerfect for a $1.2 billion loss.
“I walk away feeling honestly myself, and I can’t speak for the other jurors, that I made the right decision even if it resulted in a hung jury,” Alvey said Saturday. “There were so many inferences that needed to be drawn that I felt that it was unfair to Microsoft to go out on a limb and say, `yes.’”
Alvey described the three days of jury deliberations as stressful. The 11 other jurors sided with Novell.
“Obviously, I wanted to convince them to agree with me and they wanted to convince me to agree with them,” he told KSL.
Bill Gates testified last month that he had no idea his decision to drop a tool for outside developers would sidetrack Novell payday loan lenders. Gates said he was acting to protect Windows 95 and future versions from crashing.
Novell argued that Gates ordered Microsoft engineers to reject WordPerfect as a Windows 95 word processing application because he feared it was too good.
Alvey said the jury agreed on the technical aspects of the case but disagreed on what Novell could have accomplished “but for” Gates’ decision.
“There was a lot of speculation in this `but for’ world,” he said.
As for Gates’ testimony, Alvey said, “The man was a little sarcastic at times. If anything, it provided a little break from the monotonous questions and answers … I think from his testimony, what I heard, and what I saw in the emails, Bill Gates was a man who took every threat extremely seriously.”
Jury foreman Carl Banks said he tried hard to get a verdict.
“It was a tough case. It was long and it was hard and it was grueling,” he said. “We gave it our best shot.”
Novell attorneys have said they would seek to retry the case with a new jury. Microsoft said it would file a motion asking the judge to dismiss Novell’s complaint for good and avoid a second trial.
There was no “Mission Accomplished” banner. No victory parade down the center of this capital scarred by nearly nine years of war. No crowds of cheering Iraqis grateful for liberation from Saddam Hussein.
It took the U.S. military just 45 minutes Thursday to declare an end to its war in Iraq with a businesslike closing ceremony behind concrete blast walls in a fortified compound at Baghdad International Airport. The flag used by U.S. forces in Iraq was lowered and boxed up. On the chairs _ nearly empty of Iraqis _ were tags that listed not only the name of the assigned VIP, but the bunker to rush to in case of an attack.
With that, and brief words from top U.S. officials who flew in under tight security, the U.S. drew the curtain on a war that killed 4,487 Americans, by the Pentagon’s count, and more than 100,000 Iraqis.
The conflict also left another 32,000 Americans and far more Iraqis wounded, drained more than $800 billion from the U.S. treasury and diverted resources from Afghanistan, where the Taliban and al-Qaida rebounded after their defeat in the 2001 invasion.
“To be sure the cost was high _ in blood and treasure of the United States and also the Iraqi people,” Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told the roughly 200 troops and others in attendance. “Those lives have not been lost in vain. They gave birth to an independent, free and sovereign Iraq.”
Many Iraqis, who saw their country devastated through years of fighting, disputed that.
“With this withdrawal, the Americans are leaving behind a destroyed country,” said Mariam Khazim, a member of the Shiite Muslim sect that has dominated politics since the end of Saddam’s Sunni-led regime.
“The Americans did not leave modern schools or big factories behind them,” said Khazim, whose father was killed when a mortar shell struck his home in Sadr City. “Instead, they left thousands of widows and orphans. The Americans did not leave a free people and country behind them. In fact, they left a ruined country and a divided nation.”
The low-key ceremony stood in sharp contrast to the start of the war, which began before dawn on March 20, 2003, with a “shock and awe” airstrike in southern Baghdad where Saddam was believed to be hiding. U.S. and allied ground forces then stormed across the featureless Kuwaiti desert, accompanied by reporters, photographers and television crews embedded with the troops.
Now, the final few thousand U.S. troops will head out in orderly caravans and tightly scheduled flights, leaving behind a nation free of Saddam’s tyranny but fractured by violence and fearful of the future. Bombings and gun battles still occur almost daily. Experts are concerned about the Iraqi security forces’ ability to defend the nation against foreign threats.
U.S.-Iraqi ties are no doubt closer than they were during much of Saddam’s rule but are still short of what Washington once envisioned. Iranian influence is on the rise. One of the few positive developments from the American viewpoint _ a democratic toehold _ is far from secure.
“You will leave with great pride _ lasting pride,” Panetta told the troops seated in front of a small domed building in the airport complex. “Secure in knowing that your sacrifice has helped the Iraqi people to begin a new chapter in history.”
Many Iraqis, however, are uncertain how that chapter will unfold. Their relief at the end of Saddam, who was hanged on Dec. 30, 2006, was tempered by a long and vicious war that was launched to find nonexistent weapons of mass destruction and plunged the nation into a bloodbath between rival Muslim sects.
An insurgency that rose up within months of the April 2003 fall of Baghdad scuttled reconstruction plans and forced the Americans to keep up to 170,000 troops in Iraq years after Saddam was captured.
Iraq nowadays is far quieter than at the height of the war, but with an uneasy peace achieved through intimidation and bloodshed. The number of Iraqi neighborhoods in which members of the two Muslim sects live side by side and intermarry has dwindled.
The forced segregation, fueled by extremists from both communities, has fundamentally changed the character of the country. And it raises questions about whether the Iraqis can heal the wounds of the sectarian massacres after the Americans leave.
Some Baghdad neighborhoods, such as Hurriyah, are still guarded by thick blast walls and security checkpoints. Widespread corruption, bureaucratic hurdles and electricity shortages continue to stifle Iraq’s economy.
It was hard to find an Iraqi on Thursday who did not celebrate the exit of what they called American occupiers, neither invited nor welcome in a proud country whose capital, Baghdad, was once among the world’s great centers of culture and learning.
Some said that while grateful for U.S. help ousting Saddam, the war went on too long. A majority of Americans would agree, according to opinion polls, though many initially supported the war as a just extension of the fight against terrorism after the 9/11 attacks.
One of the many ironies of the war is that Saddam had not tolerated al-Qaida, which planned and carried out the attacks. With Saddam gone and the country in chaos, al-Qaida in Iraq became the terror movement’s largest and most dangerous franchise, attracting fighters from North Africa to Asia for a war that lingers on through suicide bombings and assassinations, albeit at a lower intensity.
The ceremony at Baghdad’s airport also featured remarks from Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who served two tours in Iraq, and Gen. Lloyd Austin, the top U.S. commander in Iraq.
Austin led the massive logistical challenge of shuttering hundreds of bases and combat outposts, and methodically moving more than 50,000 U.S. troops and their equipment out of Iraq over the last year _ while still conducting training, security assistance and counterterrorism battles.
As of Thursday, there were two U.S. bases and about 4,000 U.S. troops in Iraq _ a dramatic drop from the roughly 500 military installations during the surge ordered by President George W. Bush in 2007. All U.S. troops are slated to be out by the end of the year.
President Barack Obama had no comment on Thursday’s ceremony but told soldiers at Fort Bragg in North Carolina this week that the “war in Iraq will soon belong to history, and your service belongs to the ages.”
Despite Obama’s earlier contention that all American troops would be home for Christmas, at least 4,000 forces will remain in Kuwait for some months. The troops could be used as a quick reaction force if needed.
The U.S. will leave behind thousands of diplomats and security contractors.
“We will have to be working closely with the Iraqis to ensure the security of our civilians,” Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in a statement.
Still, the disappearance of uniformed troops marked a defining moment in Iraq’s history.
“It is a great achievement for the Iraqi people,” said Hayder al-Abadi, a Shiite lawmaker in Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s coalition. “Iraqi politicians have made their way and have made the independence and sovereignty a reality here. The Americans have committed a lot of mistakes in Iraq and they failed to protect the country.”
Joe Reagan, president of Greater Louisville Inc., has been hired as the new president and CEO of St. Louis’ lead economic development organization.
The Regional Chamber and Growth Association announced Monday that it has hired Reagan to replace Dick Fleming, who is set to step down at year’s end. The 48-year-old Indiana native has run Louisville’s largest economic development group since 2005.
“Joe brings to the RCGA a strong professional background in successful chamber management, regional economic development, public policy development and implementation,” said Ameren Corp. CEO Tom Voss, who chairs the RCGA board. “His career accomplishments and integrity have earned him the respect of both business and governmental leaders in the greater Louisville region and throughout the nation overall.”
Reagan’s name emerged as a finalist last week, with rumors that business leaders in Louisville were raising funds to try and keep him. He was reportedly one of two finalists - the other being Rhonda Hamm-Niebruegge, director of Lambert-St. Louis International Airport.
In announcing Reagan’s hiring, RCGA pointed to a list of accomplishments in Louisville that may translate to St. Louis. Among them: Helping a two-state, 26-county region work together around economic development; boosting focus on educational attainment, entrepreneurship and industry clusters; and spearheading efforts to modernize a Ford plant to keep auto industry jobs in the region.
“Joe Reagan is, without question, one of the top chamber and economic development executives in the country,” said Danny Ludeman, ceo of Wells Fargo Advisors and RCGA’s chairman-elect.
A conversation about the role of RCGA has heated up in recent weeks, as both St. Louis Mayor Francis Slay and a study conducted for the St. Louis County Economic Council have called for significant changes to its mission and business model. But RCGA leadership have said they plan to maintain the group’s focus as both a chamber of commerce and economic development agency.
RCGA said it considered nearly 200 people during its nine-month search. Reagan is set to start Feb. 1.
“I appreciate the opportunity to serve an organization that believes that results-oriented collaboration among business, civic and elected leaders is critical in driving economic development and improving quality of life in the St. Louis bi-state region,” he said.
A steady decline in the number of people applying for weekly unemployment benefits is the latest signal that the economy has strengthened and businesses may be poised to step up hiring.
Applications fell last week fell to a seasonally adjusted 381,000, the Labor Department said Thursday. That’s the lowest level since late February.
And a four-week average for applications, which smooths week-to-week fluctuations, fell for the ninth time in 11 weeks to an eight-month low.
The downward trend in unemployment benefit applications bolsters the view that the economy has improved from its spring slump, when many feared another recession was likely. Consumer confidence is up, retailers reported a strong start to the holiday shopping season and the unemployment rate fell last month to its lowest point in two and a half years.
“There have been numerous indications that the labor market is healing and today’s jobless claims report only reinforces that view,” Dan Greenhaus, chief global strategist at BTIG, a trading firm.
Ian Shepherdson, chief U.S. economist at High Frequency Economics, said the drop in unemployment benefit claims reflects relief among businesses that consumer demand didn’t plunge this fall as some had feared.
“We expect claims to head slowly downwards for the foreseeable future, and in due course payroll growth will accelerate,” Shepherdson said in a note to clients.
Applications that drop below 375,000 _ consistently _ tend to correlate with a steady decline in the unemployment rate.
The unemployment rate fell to 8.6 percent in November, the government said last week, down from 9 percent the previous month. Still, the rate dropped last month in part because more people gave up looking for work. Once the unemployed stop looking for jobs and drop out of the work force, they are no longer counted as unemployed.
Employers added a net total of 120,000 jobs last month. The economy has generated 100,000 or more jobs five months in a row _ the first time that has happened since April 2006 no faxing payday loans.
Many economists expect growth to accelerate in the final three months of the year, to about a 3 percent annual rate. That would be an improvement from 2 percent growth in the July-September period.
But the U.S. economy is vulnerable to shocks from overseas. European leaders are struggling to contain a two-year old debt crisis and the 17 nations that use the euro may already be in recession, economists say.
That could slow U.S. exports and cut into overseas profits earned by U.S. multinationals. Even worse, the crisis could force European banks to cut back on lending and U.S. banks to follow suit, leading to a credit crunch. Most economists are penciling in slower U.S. growth next year, partly because of Europe’s slowdown.
Fewer people are receiving unemployment benefits, and the number of people on extended benefits also fell. Some of that decline is because those out of work found jobs. But economists think most have likely used up all their benefits.
The number of people receiving benefits fell by 174,000 to 3.58 million. But that doesn’t include several million people receiving aid under extended programs put in place during the recession. All told, 6.6 million people received unemployment aid in the week ending Nov. 19, the latest data available. That’s about 400,000 fewer than the previous week.
Congress is debating whether to continue the extended benefit program, which expires at the end of this year. The program provides up to 99 weeks of benefits in states with high unemployment rates. If the program isn’t continued, the Labor Department estimates that about 1.8 million people could lose benefits by early February.
Global markets rose on Friday as investors welcomed German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s call to enforce tighter government spending rules and a surprise drop in the U.S. unemployment rate.
In a closely scrutinized speech to Germany’s parliament, Merkel said the 17 nations that use the euro currency must move quickly to restore market confidence, changing EU treaties to make financial controls stricter and more binding.
She reiterated her objection to so-called eurobonds _ debt jointly backed by eurozone countries _ and warned that the debt crisis will take years, not months, to fix. But her call for long-term changes suggested a commitment to strengthen financial union between countries in the euro, something analysts have said is necessary to make sure the eurozone doesn’t break up.
Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy are meeting Monday to discuss potential treaty changes. The talks will culminate in a Dec. 9 summit of EU leaders, where the proposals are expected to be debated and detailed.
Investors are hoping if eurozone governments agree to longer-term changes in the way they control their finances, the European Central Bank will agree to step up its interventions in the bond markets. Those interventions keep borrowing rates down for debt-troubled nations like Italy.
Whether the ECB will agree to step up its bond purchases is not clear, although its President Mario Draghi hinted Thursday that it was a possibility.
“Expectations have been growing that a ‘Grand Plan’ will be delivered next week,” said Frederik Ducrozet, analyst at Credit Agricole CIB.
European stocks rose, as did bonds for Italy and Spain. Britain’s FTSE 100 gained 1.1 percent to 5,548.87 while Germany’s DAX added 1.0 percent to 6,094.66. France’s CAC-40 climbed 1.4 percent to 3,172.22.
Italy’s 10-year bond yield was down to 6.52 percent, almost a full percentage lower than Wednesday, an indication investors have high hopes of next week’s talks to save the euro. Spain’s 10-year yield was down to 5.56 percent.
Wall Street also rose on the open _ the Dow Jones industrial average was up 0.8 percent at 12,111 while the Standard & Poor’s 500 rose 0.8 percent to 1,255 after the release of cautiously upbeat U.S. jobs data.
The U.S. government said the unemployment rate fell to 8.6 percent in November, the lowest in 2 1/2 years and better than economists’ expectations for an unchanged rate of 9 percent.
The world’s largest economy also added 120,000 jobs in November, while the previous two months were revised up to show another 72,000 more jobs were created _ the fourth straight month the government revised prior months higher.
Although the drop in the unemployment rate was unexpected, the increase in jobs was roughly as forecast by most analyst.
Earlier in Asia, Japan’s Nikkei 225 index rose 0.5 percent to end at 8,643.75, its highest closing in three weeks. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 0.2 percent and Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 added 1.4 percent.
South Korea’s Kospi was marginally down and mainland Chinese shares also lost ground as investors cashed in on earlier gains. The benchmark Shanghai Composite Index lost 1 percent.
Markets continued to enjoy some momentum from Wednesday, when the U.S. Federal Reserve, European Central Bank, Bank of England and the central banks of Canada, Japan and Switzerland jointly made it easier for banks to borrow dollars.
The coordinated effort was meant to prevent Europe’s debt crisis from exploding into a global panic. Should a European bank fail or if a country default on its debt, investors fear it could result in a freeze-up in global lending like the one that occurred in 2008 when Lehman Brothers collapsed.
China’s central bank also acted to release money for lending and to shore up growth by lowering bank reserve levels for the first time in three years. The bank actions caused global stocks to rally Thursday.
Benchmark oil for January delivery was down 5 cents to $100.15 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange on Friday. The contract lost 16 cents to end at $100.20 per barrel on the Nymex on Thursday.
In currency trading, the euro rose to $1.3478 from $1.3460 late Thursday in New York. The dollar rose to 77.93 yen from 77.76 yen.
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