Market Story Today: Weak U.S. Dollar
By: Market leaders like metal and energy and tech stocks got help from financials today--that hasnt happened in a long time. But the big story was the weak U.S. dollar, which helped push gold, silver, and oil to new highs. Commodity stocks like precious metals, steel, and iron ore also surged.
A modest rally in financials (with exception of Citi, down again) also helped. Goldman Sachs again denied persistent rumors that it would soon announce write-downs to their portfolio of mortgage derivatives. Bears insist that if Citi has had large write-downs, Goldman must also. Bulls say maybe Goldman was just better at managing risk.
Retailers split as Morgan Stanley downgraded the entire retail sector on concerns that earnings estimates would continue to drop into 2008. They specifically downgraded Nordstrom on concerns that the high end consumer was slowing down. New low for Nordstrom.
Finally, airlines had a terrible day as oil (and jet fuel) hit new highs;US Air also reported weak October traffic.
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