Bear Mountain Bull

It’s time again for a little BMB R&R, especially with the market behaving as bizarrely as it’s been. Maybe if we stop watching it start to behave a little better…

Posting will be very light and variable over the course of this week, but we’ll put up an open thread each market day for our readers to comment on the day’s market activity or to post any interesting links they might run across.

Check the space below for whatever the latest might be during this ‘off’ time, and please visit the various sites in the ‘Links’ and ‘Regular Stops’ for up-to-date market news and analysis.

BMB will be back in full swing by next weekend.

The market seems to like Johnson & Johnson’s acquisition of Guidant just fine.

Chart courtesy of StockCharts.com

The market doesn’t appear to be totally thrilled by Symantec’s acquisition of Veritas.

Chart courtesy of StockCharts.com

Watch what you’re opening in your email.

TTWO, PLMO, ADBE all down in after-hours trading on earnings reports.

Merger and economic news swirled about today, and the markets couldn’t decide what to do with it all, ending mixed on the day on strong volume. The Dow managed to add 14 points (+0.1%) to 10705, while the Nasdaq lost 16 points (-0.8%) to 2146 and the S&P 500 fell 2 points (-0.2%) to 1203. The Russell 2000 fell 6 points (-0.9%) to 643, and the yield on the 10-year Treasury jumped to 4.18%.

Market internals were negative, with advances trailing declines by almost 1 to 2, and up volume lagged down volume by 4 to 5. New highs still easily outnumbered new lows, by 387 to 33.

Most of the upside came out of the health care sector (helped by JNJ’s 4.7% gain), with drug stocks up 2.4%, and health care products up 1.5%. The downers were led by the internets (-2.4%), gold stocks (-1.7%), semiconductors (-1.6%), computer hardware (-1.5%), and oil stocks (-1.2%).

Crude oil held its ground above $44/barrel, the US dollar got a 1% boost, and gold prices fell to $437/ounce.

Schaeffer’s takes a look at the long term picture for a number of market and sector indices.

When making investment choices, always take into account the long-term trend in addition to the short-term: you may find that what looks like a good move in the short-term view is actually contrary to the longer-term momentum.

The Commerce Department reported this morning that the current account deficit rose to a record level in the third quarter.

That news is most likely to blame for the selloff in the bond market today, which has sent the 10-year yield up more than 0.1% today to 4.184%.

Lots of stuff this morning:

• Merger news: Johnson & Johnson and Guidant, Symantec and Veritas
• Weekly jobless claims fall
• October housing starts fall
• Earnings from FedEx, Goldman Sachs, etc.