Economy: better signs. Markets driven by stronger economic news and commentary from banks and autos.
1) Europe, China break out with stronger China Manufacturing PMI. Shanghai, Germany, France, Hong Kong, U.K., Australia, and all at highs for the year.
2) U.S. ISM, a survey of purcahsing managers, was stronger than expected:
-new order components rising in U.S. and other countries.
-the July number corresponds to a 2.4 percent increase in real GDP. That is good growth territory.
3) Financials up on strong European bank reports from HSBC , Barclays
4) the weak dollar (Dollar index at lowest level since September) pushes up commodities, commodity stocks
5) Autos, manufacturers stronger on car sales reports
-Chrysler sales: July down 9% year over year, but up 30% from June, SAAR 11.2 million for entire industry
-Ford : July saw the first year over year increase in sales in 2 years (but Ford says clunkers-driven demand is not sustainable for rest of 2009)
Finally, an important level: 1000 in the SPX is only a round number, which usually has an emotional but not technical importance, but in this case there is also a technical component: it makes it an official 50 percent rally off the 666 March 6th low.
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- The Dow 30 in Real Time
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- The CNBC Stock Blog
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