By Dan Denning • June 20th, 2008 • Related Articles • Filed Under
About the Author
Dan DenningDan Denning is the author of 2005's best-selling The Bull Hunter (John Wiley & Sons). A specialist in small-cap stocks, Dan draws on his network of global contacts from his base in Melbourne, Australia and pens the small cap newsletter, The Australian Small Cap Investigator. He is also a contributing editor to the Australian resource investing publication Diggers & Drillers.
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* Aquaculture: Soybeans and Corn Under Water
* Farmers Say ‘Rain, Rain Go Away’ Throughout the United States
* Farmers Feel Consumers Blame Them for High Food Costs
* Record Misery Index Sends People Scrambling for Gold
* Why Choose Gold When Real Interest Rates Sink?
Filed Under: The Americas
Tags: bernanke • Gold
Gold and silver are calling Ben Bernanke's bluff this week. Bernanke huffed and he puffed and he bluffed and he bluffed all month long about inflation. But the market realises that with America's housing market mired in the muck, the Fed won't be raising rates to defend the greenback this year.
In the futures market, the odds of a Fed rate rise dropped from 26% last week to 12% this week. The U.S. dollar continues to fall and gold was up US$6.60 in New York trading while silver hit US$17.34. Commodities have spoken. "Liar!"
Is there a big move coming in the precious metals? The Fed's open market committee meets next week to discuss and set the price for America's money. By then, we reckon traders will have a healthy scepticism that the Fed is willing or even able to defend the dollar with higher rates. Gold and silver have been treading water, technically speaking, for a while. Don't be surprised to see new investment demand for precious metals as an inflation hedge.
Once you get people expecting higher prices, it's hard to change their mind. Inflation is like a mental contagion. The Fed should know this. It started the epidemic with lower rates.
This isn't good: "Australia's mortgage arrears rate rose to a record in March as borrowers struggled to make repayments because of rising inflation and higher interest rates, according to Standard & Poor's."
That's from the Age. "Payments more than 30 days late on so-called prime loans increased to 1.45% of mortgages used to secure bonds, from 1.37% in January, S&P said in a report."
It's not a tsunami of defaults yet. But as far as we can tell, many Aussies remain convinced housing prices never go down. Most are unaware that a mortgage bubble is responsible for rising house prices, some the demographic flim-flammery you get from the housing industry.
Is protein about to get more expensive? We haven't covered the flooding in the mid-West of the US because it's in the US, not Australia. But everything affects everything in the globalised world. If US corn production craters because of a lost crop due to the massive spring floods in America's Corn Belt, there will be less corn. Less corn for ethanol. Less corn to feed animals like pigs and cows, which give us hungry humans are protein.
You can substitute wheat and rice for corn. But there's no replacing Iowa. Oil rigs can be rebuilt after cyclones. If you lose an entire year's crop or your farmland goes under water, it might be a good idea to stock up on staples. They're probably going up in price. It shows you just how valuable farmland is as capital.
Dan Denning
The Daily Reckoning Australia
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Saturday, June 21, 2008
October Surprise? In June?"
by Jon Nadler
Senior Metals Market Analyst
Friday's New York gold was once again range-bound and repeated yesterday's pattern of early gains followed by afternoon declines, although today's focus was a near $3 gain in crude oil following news of an ominous June 2nd Israeli military drill and current threats by Venezuela's Hugo Chavez to suspend oil shipments to the EU. The dollar traded lower most of the day amid newly scaled-back expectations of rate hike action by the Fed next week. It was last seen at 73.05 on the index but had fallen to 1.562 against the euro.
Stocks finished a week that is best forgotten, showing a 221 point loss (worst since March) and the Dow now finds itself flirting dangerously close with the pivotal 11,750 area. The "bright spot" for the day was a fairly decent estimate of US growth put forth by the IMF, which concluded that the U.S. economy has fared well "considering the severity of headwinds it has faced, and that its GDP should gradually improve" to around 2% in 2009 after being "roughly flat" in Q4 of 2008. The question, of course, is what Q2 and Q3 will be tallied up at; flat-to-negative, or starting to pick up?
At the root of such changing Fed punditry sentiment was the jittery week we saw in financials (worst showing in bank stocks in a decade) as well as the forecasts for bank earnings going forward. Merrill sees investors effectively throwing in the proverbial towel when it comes to bank stocks. With capitulation come buying opportunities - normally. A normal year, 2008 has not been thus far. The consensus among analysts therefore, calls for no Fed action next week. Perhaps more Fedspeak will be on tap. In the interim, showing that it is serious about inflation combat, the Mexican central bank sprang a surprise .25 bp rate hike on the markets instead of offering propagandistic jawboning.
The final trading session of the week had gold easing off its intra-day highs in the afternoon hours, and the metal once again came closer to the $900 area after a duo of attempts to take out overhead resistance at $910 on both Thursday and Friday. The precious metal might manage an above $900 close today (it did not achieve it on Thursday afternoon) but is still needs to vault above $945 to regain its stride. Participants focused mainly on crude oil and on geopolitical developments in the absence of data from the economic calendar. OPEC gets to together this weekend and will likely have participants pulling out some large wrenches with which to turn up the flow of crude oil to the world. (The price of black gold was -at last check - up $2.6 at $134.80 per barrel.) This, after weeks or protests, frustration, pleas, and - the latest - a major hike in domestic price by China.
Predictably, Iran's response to the de facto early June Israeli rehearsal of an air attack on its nuclear installations was stern, swift, and laden with a threatening retaliatory tone that included words such as 'heavy blow' to describe its potential actions. Our good friend, Roger Wiegand, sums up the tense situation as follows:
" What lies ahead in this radically changing environment? In our view, the primary news changing event is the forthcoming attack by Israel on Iran. Our European friends have been predicting this for months and we chose to think it might not happen. Now we are about 80-90% certain it will. This event, if it becomes true, will drive energy and precious metals prices to the moon. On the other hand, stock markets could severely crash. The disruptions in global banking and credit markets might receive immeasurable damage; perhaps some of it un-repairable. One analyst says its a partial ploy to keep [President] Bush in office after January based upon the War Powers Emergency Act."
Recall that we alluded to an 'outside' and 'outsized' event as the best (perhaps only) possible driver of another rally by gold to four digits in our last Marketwatch TV interview in May. This is one of those potential events, although we are still nowhere near as confident as Roger is about the percentage of its occurrence probability.
Silver also gave up most of its Friday gains late in the day, and was last seen up 1 cent at $17.33 while platinum recouped some of Thursday's losses with a $10 gain to $2051 and palladium climbed $1 to $470 per ounce. Poor US auto sales estimates drove the noble metals to lower levels during the week. Gold futures closed the week out with a 3.5% gain after losing about 2% last week.
Also from the world of platinum, Johnson Matthey's Platinum Today reports that:
"The Tokyo Commodity Exchange will cooperate with the Tokyo Stock Exchange to develop exchange traded funds (ETFs) and Multi Commodity Exchange will now commence future trading in platinum. Platinum is now actively traded at Tokyo Community Exchange in Japan and New York Commodity Exchange as the metal is increasingly used as a catalytic converter in Japan.
According to reports from Reuters, TOCOM Chairman Masaaki Nangaku believes that the launch of commodities ETFs will have a good impact on developing the sector. Further reports from the Economic Times revealed that Joseph Messey, Chief Executive Officer of the Multi Commodity Exchange MS, said that platinum needed to be added to the offering.
"We were missing the presence of an important metal like platinum and now, since we have received approval, we are looking to start future trading activity soon," he explained.
"With the presence of a precious metal like platinum, investors will now have more opportunities for investment and the industry can hedge their requirements," he added."
Pre-Fed meeting trading floor chatter has begun in earnest and it points to rising expectations that the central bank will leave rates as they are (currently at an 88% probability level) and that it will also push potential rate hikes back a few months as the economic picture sorts itself out in the US. Marketwatch echoes the speculative crowd's latest sentiments and cites a few contrarian factor as well:
"Surging commodity prices and strident warnings from Federal Reserve officials about inflation have some in the market betting that the central bank will increase interest rates as early as this fall, according to closely watched federal funds futures contracts. Yet, five other indicators flatly contradict that outlook, suggesting that the central bank will instead opt to keep borrowing at currently low levels to prevent the ailing U.S. economy from experiencing even more pain.
Analysts point to at least five reasons the Fed won't rush to raise rates: 1) lending rates show the credit crunch continues; 2) the banking system is still fragile; 3) rates hikes in election years are rare; 4) the economy, especially housing, still poses a threat; and 5) flattening the yield curve could pressure bank profits.
Falling home prices and continuing bank losses, along with market rates for short-term loans, are likely to hold back the Fed. That's despite the message telegraphed by the bond market's favorite interest-rate indicator: fed funds futures, which are used to determine market odds of a move in interest rates by the Federal Reserve."
The first three days of next week will provide enough fuel for trading action of all kinds. Aside from the Fed meeting, we expect position statements from OPEC and from the ECB. Geopolitics -largely absent from the scene since December- are back on the stage. Summer begins tonight. Will it be a long, hot summer?
Taken From : http://www.ibtimes.com
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Senior Metals Market Analyst
Friday's New York gold was once again range-bound and repeated yesterday's pattern of early gains followed by afternoon declines, although today's focus was a near $3 gain in crude oil following news of an ominous June 2nd Israeli military drill and current threats by Venezuela's Hugo Chavez to suspend oil shipments to the EU. The dollar traded lower most of the day amid newly scaled-back expectations of rate hike action by the Fed next week. It was last seen at 73.05 on the index but had fallen to 1.562 against the euro.
Stocks finished a week that is best forgotten, showing a 221 point loss (worst since March) and the Dow now finds itself flirting dangerously close with the pivotal 11,750 area. The "bright spot" for the day was a fairly decent estimate of US growth put forth by the IMF, which concluded that the U.S. economy has fared well "considering the severity of headwinds it has faced, and that its GDP should gradually improve" to around 2% in 2009 after being "roughly flat" in Q4 of 2008. The question, of course, is what Q2 and Q3 will be tallied up at; flat-to-negative, or starting to pick up?
At the root of such changing Fed punditry sentiment was the jittery week we saw in financials (worst showing in bank stocks in a decade) as well as the forecasts for bank earnings going forward. Merrill sees investors effectively throwing in the proverbial towel when it comes to bank stocks. With capitulation come buying opportunities - normally. A normal year, 2008 has not been thus far. The consensus among analysts therefore, calls for no Fed action next week. Perhaps more Fedspeak will be on tap. In the interim, showing that it is serious about inflation combat, the Mexican central bank sprang a surprise .25 bp rate hike on the markets instead of offering propagandistic jawboning.
The final trading session of the week had gold easing off its intra-day highs in the afternoon hours, and the metal once again came closer to the $900 area after a duo of attempts to take out overhead resistance at $910 on both Thursday and Friday. The precious metal might manage an above $900 close today (it did not achieve it on Thursday afternoon) but is still needs to vault above $945 to regain its stride. Participants focused mainly on crude oil and on geopolitical developments in the absence of data from the economic calendar. OPEC gets to together this weekend and will likely have participants pulling out some large wrenches with which to turn up the flow of crude oil to the world. (The price of black gold was -at last check - up $2.6 at $134.80 per barrel.) This, after weeks or protests, frustration, pleas, and - the latest - a major hike in domestic price by China.
Predictably, Iran's response to the de facto early June Israeli rehearsal of an air attack on its nuclear installations was stern, swift, and laden with a threatening retaliatory tone that included words such as 'heavy blow' to describe its potential actions. Our good friend, Roger Wiegand, sums up the tense situation as follows:
" What lies ahead in this radically changing environment? In our view, the primary news changing event is the forthcoming attack by Israel on Iran. Our European friends have been predicting this for months and we chose to think it might not happen. Now we are about 80-90% certain it will. This event, if it becomes true, will drive energy and precious metals prices to the moon. On the other hand, stock markets could severely crash. The disruptions in global banking and credit markets might receive immeasurable damage; perhaps some of it un-repairable. One analyst says its a partial ploy to keep [President] Bush in office after January based upon the War Powers Emergency Act."
Recall that we alluded to an 'outside' and 'outsized' event as the best (perhaps only) possible driver of another rally by gold to four digits in our last Marketwatch TV interview in May. This is one of those potential events, although we are still nowhere near as confident as Roger is about the percentage of its occurrence probability.
Silver also gave up most of its Friday gains late in the day, and was last seen up 1 cent at $17.33 while platinum recouped some of Thursday's losses with a $10 gain to $2051 and palladium climbed $1 to $470 per ounce. Poor US auto sales estimates drove the noble metals to lower levels during the week. Gold futures closed the week out with a 3.5% gain after losing about 2% last week.
Also from the world of platinum, Johnson Matthey's Platinum Today reports that:
"The Tokyo Commodity Exchange will cooperate with the Tokyo Stock Exchange to develop exchange traded funds (ETFs) and Multi Commodity Exchange will now commence future trading in platinum. Platinum is now actively traded at Tokyo Community Exchange in Japan and New York Commodity Exchange as the metal is increasingly used as a catalytic converter in Japan.
According to reports from Reuters, TOCOM Chairman Masaaki Nangaku believes that the launch of commodities ETFs will have a good impact on developing the sector. Further reports from the Economic Times revealed that Joseph Messey, Chief Executive Officer of the Multi Commodity Exchange MS, said that platinum needed to be added to the offering.
"We were missing the presence of an important metal like platinum and now, since we have received approval, we are looking to start future trading activity soon," he explained.
"With the presence of a precious metal like platinum, investors will now have more opportunities for investment and the industry can hedge their requirements," he added."
Pre-Fed meeting trading floor chatter has begun in earnest and it points to rising expectations that the central bank will leave rates as they are (currently at an 88% probability level) and that it will also push potential rate hikes back a few months as the economic picture sorts itself out in the US. Marketwatch echoes the speculative crowd's latest sentiments and cites a few contrarian factor as well:
"Surging commodity prices and strident warnings from Federal Reserve officials about inflation have some in the market betting that the central bank will increase interest rates as early as this fall, according to closely watched federal funds futures contracts. Yet, five other indicators flatly contradict that outlook, suggesting that the central bank will instead opt to keep borrowing at currently low levels to prevent the ailing U.S. economy from experiencing even more pain.
Analysts point to at least five reasons the Fed won't rush to raise rates: 1) lending rates show the credit crunch continues; 2) the banking system is still fragile; 3) rates hikes in election years are rare; 4) the economy, especially housing, still poses a threat; and 5) flattening the yield curve could pressure bank profits.
Falling home prices and continuing bank losses, along with market rates for short-term loans, are likely to hold back the Fed. That's despite the message telegraphed by the bond market's favorite interest-rate indicator: fed funds futures, which are used to determine market odds of a move in interest rates by the Federal Reserve."
The first three days of next week will provide enough fuel for trading action of all kinds. Aside from the Fed meeting, we expect position statements from OPEC and from the ECB. Geopolitics -largely absent from the scene since December- are back on the stage. Summer begins tonight. Will it be a long, hot summer?
Taken From : http://www.ibtimes.com
Read more...
Stocks drop as credit woes continue, oil rises
By TIM PARADIS
20 June 2008 @ 06:48 pm EST
NEW YORK (AP) - Stocks capped a difficult week with steep losses Friday amid escalating worries about the financial and automotive sectors and a rebound in oil prices. The major indexes fell by more than 1 1/2 percent on the day, and the Dow Jones industrial average gave up more than 200 points to end at its lowest level in three months.
While investors have seen other triple-digit days in the past year since concerns about the economy began emerging, the Dow's first finish under 12,000 since mid-March could deal Wall Street a psychological blow.
An afternoon downgrade of automakers helped draw out sellers in the stock market while Treasury prices rose as investors sought the safety of government debt.
A Merrill Lynch downgrade of regional banks added to the market's initial anxiety, which ballooned Thursday when Citigroup Inc. warned of significant debt markdowns for the second quarter, Washington Mutual Inc. announced 1,200 job cuts and Moody's Investors Service decided late in the day to downgrade the two biggest bond insurers.
Troubling news about the financial sector piled up all week, sending stocks to steep losses. Early on, the investment banks posted profit declines, Fifth Third Bancorp said it need to raise $2 billion in capital and two Bear Stearns hedge fund managers were charged with lying to investors--causing many investors to flee from stocks.
Quincy Krosby, chief investment strategist at The Hartford, said Friday's session saw a confluence of the worries that investors have been grappling with as they try to determine where the economy is headed.
"I liken it to the GPS system saying 'recalculating,'" she said, referring to the market's uncertainty. "There's no clarity, there's no confidence."
Krosby added: "The crosscurrents are coming at a time when the backdrop for the economy appears to be stabilizing. And yet the headline risk is unrelenting."
The headlines Friday helped send the Dow down 220.40, or 1.83 percent, to 11,842.69. The blue chips haven't closed below 12,000 since March 17, when the market was worried about Bear Stearns Cos. collapsing. Friday's pullback left Coca Cola Co. as the only advancer among the 30 stocks that comprise the Dow.
Broader stock indicators also dropped. The Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 24.90, or 1.85 percent, to 1,317.93, and the Nasdaq composite index fell 55.97, or 2.27 percent, to 2,406.09.
Declining issues outnumbered advancers by about 5 to 1 on the New York Stock Exchange, where consolidated volume came to a heavy 5.15 billion shares compared with 4.44 billion shares traded Thursday. Volume was heavy in part because of "quadruple witching"--the simultaneous expiration of four types of options contracts.
For the week, the Dow fell 3.78 percent, the S&P 500 lost 3.1 percent and the Nasdaq declined 1.97 percent.
Bond prices rose Friday as stocks sank. The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note, which moves opposite its price, fell to 4.17 percent from 4.21 percent late Thursday.
Concerns over further tensions between Israel and Iran added to investors' worries and pushed oil prices higher.
"That introduces dramatic uncertainty," Krosby said of the investors' reaction to unease in the Middle East.
Crude oil futures jumped $2.69 to settle at $134.62 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, recovering some of Thursday's drop of nearly $5 per barrel on news of a fuel price hike in China.
Investors are awaiting the weekend's meeting in Saudi Arabia of oil producers and consumer nations, which could bring some relief to the problem of soaring oil prices. But many analysts believe the gathering might end up being a mere finger-pointing session.
The concerns made for a difficult market.
"There has to be reticence about getting back in," said Stephen Carl, principal and head of equity trading at The Williams Capital Group. "It's definitely an ugly end to the week."
Bond insurer MBIA Inc. fell 86 cents, or 13 percent, to $5.59, while competitor Ambac Financial Group Inc. edged up 2 cents to $2.05, after losing their "AAA" rating from Moody's.
Another ratings move hit stocks of automakers. Standard & Poor's Ratings Services placed the corporate credit ratings of General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co. and Chrysler LLC on watch with negative implications. The classification means ratings have a one-in-two chance of being downgraded in the next three months. S&P believes high fuel costs will hurt the U.S. auto market through 2009.
GM fell $1, or 6.7 percent, to $13.79, while Ford lost 51 cents, or 8.1 percent, to $5.81.
The dollar fell against most other major currencies, while gold prices rose.
The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies fell 12.10, or 1.64, to 725.73.
Overseas, Japan's Nikkei stock average dropped 1.33 percent. Britain's FTSE 100 fell 1.53 percent, Germany's DAX index declined 2.12 percent, and France's CAC-40 fell 1.79 percent.
___
The Dow Jones industrial average ended the week down 464.66, or 3.78 percent, at 11,842.69. The Standard & Poor's 500 index finished down 42.10, or 3.10 percent, at 1,317.93. The Nasdaq composite index ended the week down 48.41, or 1.97 percent, at 2,406.09.
The Russell 2000 index finished the week down 7.88, or 1.07 percent, at 725.73.
The Dow Jones Wilshire 5000 Composite Index--a free-float weighted index that measures 5,000 U.S. based companies--ended Friday at 13,415.89, down 374.77 points, or 2.70 percent, for the week. A year ago, the index was at 15,291.15.
Taken From : http://www.ibtimes.com
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20 June 2008 @ 06:48 pm EST
NEW YORK (AP) - Stocks capped a difficult week with steep losses Friday amid escalating worries about the financial and automotive sectors and a rebound in oil prices. The major indexes fell by more than 1 1/2 percent on the day, and the Dow Jones industrial average gave up more than 200 points to end at its lowest level in three months.
While investors have seen other triple-digit days in the past year since concerns about the economy began emerging, the Dow's first finish under 12,000 since mid-March could deal Wall Street a psychological blow.
An afternoon downgrade of automakers helped draw out sellers in the stock market while Treasury prices rose as investors sought the safety of government debt.
A Merrill Lynch downgrade of regional banks added to the market's initial anxiety, which ballooned Thursday when Citigroup Inc. warned of significant debt markdowns for the second quarter, Washington Mutual Inc. announced 1,200 job cuts and Moody's Investors Service decided late in the day to downgrade the two biggest bond insurers.
Troubling news about the financial sector piled up all week, sending stocks to steep losses. Early on, the investment banks posted profit declines, Fifth Third Bancorp said it need to raise $2 billion in capital and two Bear Stearns hedge fund managers were charged with lying to investors--causing many investors to flee from stocks.
Quincy Krosby, chief investment strategist at The Hartford, said Friday's session saw a confluence of the worries that investors have been grappling with as they try to determine where the economy is headed.
"I liken it to the GPS system saying 'recalculating,'" she said, referring to the market's uncertainty. "There's no clarity, there's no confidence."
Krosby added: "The crosscurrents are coming at a time when the backdrop for the economy appears to be stabilizing. And yet the headline risk is unrelenting."
The headlines Friday helped send the Dow down 220.40, or 1.83 percent, to 11,842.69. The blue chips haven't closed below 12,000 since March 17, when the market was worried about Bear Stearns Cos. collapsing. Friday's pullback left Coca Cola Co. as the only advancer among the 30 stocks that comprise the Dow.
Broader stock indicators also dropped. The Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 24.90, or 1.85 percent, to 1,317.93, and the Nasdaq composite index fell 55.97, or 2.27 percent, to 2,406.09.
Declining issues outnumbered advancers by about 5 to 1 on the New York Stock Exchange, where consolidated volume came to a heavy 5.15 billion shares compared with 4.44 billion shares traded Thursday. Volume was heavy in part because of "quadruple witching"--the simultaneous expiration of four types of options contracts.
For the week, the Dow fell 3.78 percent, the S&P 500 lost 3.1 percent and the Nasdaq declined 1.97 percent.
Bond prices rose Friday as stocks sank. The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note, which moves opposite its price, fell to 4.17 percent from 4.21 percent late Thursday.
Concerns over further tensions between Israel and Iran added to investors' worries and pushed oil prices higher.
"That introduces dramatic uncertainty," Krosby said of the investors' reaction to unease in the Middle East.
Crude oil futures jumped $2.69 to settle at $134.62 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, recovering some of Thursday's drop of nearly $5 per barrel on news of a fuel price hike in China.
Investors are awaiting the weekend's meeting in Saudi Arabia of oil producers and consumer nations, which could bring some relief to the problem of soaring oil prices. But many analysts believe the gathering might end up being a mere finger-pointing session.
The concerns made for a difficult market.
"There has to be reticence about getting back in," said Stephen Carl, principal and head of equity trading at The Williams Capital Group. "It's definitely an ugly end to the week."
Bond insurer MBIA Inc. fell 86 cents, or 13 percent, to $5.59, while competitor Ambac Financial Group Inc. edged up 2 cents to $2.05, after losing their "AAA" rating from Moody's.
Another ratings move hit stocks of automakers. Standard & Poor's Ratings Services placed the corporate credit ratings of General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co. and Chrysler LLC on watch with negative implications. The classification means ratings have a one-in-two chance of being downgraded in the next three months. S&P believes high fuel costs will hurt the U.S. auto market through 2009.
GM fell $1, or 6.7 percent, to $13.79, while Ford lost 51 cents, or 8.1 percent, to $5.81.
The dollar fell against most other major currencies, while gold prices rose.
The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies fell 12.10, or 1.64, to 725.73.
Overseas, Japan's Nikkei stock average dropped 1.33 percent. Britain's FTSE 100 fell 1.53 percent, Germany's DAX index declined 2.12 percent, and France's CAC-40 fell 1.79 percent.
___
The Dow Jones industrial average ended the week down 464.66, or 3.78 percent, at 11,842.69. The Standard & Poor's 500 index finished down 42.10, or 3.10 percent, at 1,317.93. The Nasdaq composite index ended the week down 48.41, or 1.97 percent, at 2,406.09.
The Russell 2000 index finished the week down 7.88, or 1.07 percent, at 725.73.
The Dow Jones Wilshire 5000 Composite Index--a free-float weighted index that measures 5,000 U.S. based companies--ended Friday at 13,415.89, down 374.77 points, or 2.70 percent, for the week. A year ago, the index was at 15,291.15.
Taken From : http://www.ibtimes.com
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