Stock Market Snapshot

The U.S. markets made a strong show on Thursday of thwarting off the negative news from London and the airlines threat with a +13 for the Dow and a +4 for the Nasdaq by midday. Other markets also had interest for the analysts as oil dropped by -$1.60 or $74.75 a barrel, and gold was off by $14.00 or $648 an ounce.

In other economic news, the Commerce Department said the trade deficit for June was an improvement from May. The trade gap was at $64.8, off by 0.3%. But was still up slightly from forecasts. May’s revised numbers were up by 1.9% or $65 billion, which is the second highest on record.

The mouse that roared is at Disney as the company reported earnings of $1.7 billion for the quarter. DVD sales of The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe plus the release of Cars helped. Hey, they also just increased the cost of admission for a one day pass for Disney Land and Disney World; now it’s $67 per day, ouch!

The Big Mac factor in your life. Swiss Banking giant UBS uses a survey called the “Big Mac” or the number of minuets / hours it takes for you to work and earn the cost of this hamburger. Numero uno was Tokyo, the highest earning power at 10 minutes, London ,Sydney, and Toronto were just edged out. In New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Miami it takes 13 minutes of labor time to net the wage. The global average is 35 minutes.

 

Posted on Thu, 10 Aug 2006 by Sonja Rudd | Add Comment | Email | Link