Peter Schacknow, Senior Producer, CNBC Breaking News Desk
With three trading days to go for 2011, many Wall Street investors have already brought their year to a close. Tuesday saw the year’s lightest full-day volume of the year on the New York Stock Exchange, with the major averages barely budging.
The S&P 500 did manage to chalk up again of exactly one tenth of a point, giving it its first 5-day win streak since mid-September.
The 2011 breakeven watch remains on for the Nasdaq Composite, which is now within 1% of erasing its 2011 losses. The Dow is up 6.2% for the year, while the S&P 500 has eked out a 0.6% gain.
A lack of stock market excitement is likely to continue today, with no government economic reports on today’s calendar. The usual Wednesday release of the Energy Department’s oil and gasoline inventory figures is delayed until Thursday because of this week’s Monday holiday. We will, however, get the usual weekly report on mortgage applications from the Mortgage Bankers Association at 7am ET.
The dearth of news extends to the corporate earnings calendar, which is completely blank today, although we will watch for any earnings warnings ahead of fourth quarter earnings season.
Morgan Stanley (MS) will be a stock to watch today, as it announces plans to cut 580 jobs at four offices in New York City. We’ll also watch shares of New York Times Co. (NYT) as it announces plans to sell 16 regional newspapers and related businesses to Halifax Media for $143 million. Online retailers such as Amazon.com (AMZN) will be on the watch list today as well, as comScore reports online holiday spending has totaled more than $35 billion this year, up 15% from the same period a year ago.
BP (BP) could get a boost today after an Alaska judge dismissed government charges against the oil giant. The government had charged that BP had violated terms of its criminal probation following a 2009 oil spill in that state.
Medicis Pharmaceutical (MRX) could be under pressure today, after cutting its revenue and earnings outlook for the fourth quarter. Chipmaker Cavium (CAVM) also cut its outlook, prompting a 7% after-hours slide in its shares.
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