Equities and the Economy:

We actually saw some movement in U.S. stocks yesterday, but, unfortunately, it wasn’t the movement we like. The Dow lost 105 points, 0.58%, to end at 18,037, the S&P 500 fell 14, 0.68%, to 2,112 and the Nasdaq closed down 36 points, 0.69%, at 5,154. Here are some not-so-good statistics. Yesterday marked the 6th consecutive session the S&P has closed lower. This is the S&P’s longest losing streak since August 2015. Yesterday’s S&P close was a 4 month low. The Dow is now on par with levels seen back in December 2014, i.e. the index is essentially flat in the past nearly 2 years. That being said, the S&P is up 3.3% y-t-d. Not sure how true this is but the newswires are blaming the angst surrounding the election. Keep in mind folks, though, we’ve had a 7 ½ year bull market. One of the longest in history. All this being said, technical support at ~2,100 basis the S&P has not been violated, so all-in-all this is normal price movement within the trading range.

Turning to the economic data, which I usually do at this point, the Institute of Supply Management yesterday stated its index of manufacturing activity rose to 51.9 in October for September’s 51.5, basically unchanged and at expectations. The take away here is the number is over 50 indicating growth. The Commerce Department reported that construction spending fell 0.4% in September to an annualized rate of $1.15 trillion. This was disappointing for The Street was looking for a rise of 0.5%.

Today we have ADP’s private payrolls report which is the prelude to the big report of the week which comes out Friday, the Labor Department’s Employment Situation Report for October. Also today the FOMC concludes its two day meeting.

Overnight the Asian markets closed lower and the European markets are doing the same but this is a reaction to yesterday’s U.S. equity price action. The Dow is down 20. FYI, the S&P is close to support at 2,108.

Oil

Early in yesterday’s session oil prices traded higher as the U.S. dollar fell against other currencies but the fundamentals trumped and WTI closed down 19¢ at $46.67 and Brent lost 47¢ at $48.14. Chatter, so let’s move on to today. Last evening after the bell the API reported in its weekly report that crude inventories rose 9.3 million bbls last week. This was a shocker coming in five times higher than expectations. Now somewhat mitigating the crude oil data was that product (mostly gasoline and diesel) inventories were down sharply, 6.7 million barrels, twice the expected level. The aggregate was a 2.6 million rise which was not nearly as bad as the “headline” number, but still overtly bearish, and the market is responding accordingly with WTI off 84¢ this morning.

Unless Saudi Arabia does it all alone, I just don’t see how OPEC is going to put together a production cut. Nigeria just announced their October production rose 600,000 barrels from September to 2.1 million bpd. Libya stated it doubled its shipments in October from September equating to 233,000 bpd and Russia announced its output climbed to 11.2 million bpd, a record.

Courtesy of MDA Information Systems LLC

Natural Gas

Uggggggly! That’s the expression traders use for what’s happened to the natural gas market. Prices continued to get clobbered. Yesterday the December contract fell 12.4¢, 4.1%, closing at $2.902. In just 3 days the front month price has fallen 38¢, 12%. We’re still over the November contract expiration of $2.764. The combination of, please for the redundancy, the warm short, medium and long term warm weather forecasts and the recognition by traders that we’re very likely to have more gas in storage going into this winter than last winter (which was a record!) are creating a feast for the bears. I’ll tell you this though. The first long term weather forecast we see (I’m talking about late December or January) that shows normal or below normal temperatures this market is going to snap back.

When I came into the office this morning natty was down 8¢ but has recovered a good portion of those losses with it being down 3.6¢ as I write.

Elsewhere

Did you know:

During the election of 1872 presidential incumbent Ulysses S. Grant ran against a corpse. His opponent, Horace Greely, died before the election was finalized. Guess who won.

George Washington is the only U.S. president in history to win 100% of the Electoral College vote. This was mainly because organized parties weren’t yet formed and he ran unopposed.

U.S Presidents choose the Bible or books they want to use on inauguration day. President Obama chose two bibles: the Lincoln Bible and underneath it Martin Luther King’s bible

Actress Rosanne Barr once attempted to run for president and got as far as filing with the Federal Election Commission under the “Green Tea Party Ticket.”

Andrew Jackson’s inauguration party was so wild that Jackson snuck out of the White House and spent the night at a hotel. Servants had to drag tubs of punch out on to the lawn to lure the crowds out of building.

Norman Thomas of the Socialist Party ran for president more times than anyone in history. He ran 6 times but was never elected.

Washington was reluctant to become president and noted to his future secretary of war, Henry Knox, that becoming a president felt like he was going to “the place of execution.”

Democrats use a donkey as their mascot thanks to Andrew Jackson. When his critics called him a “jackass” because of this populist views, he embraced the image even using it alongside his slogan, “Let the people rule.”

John Adams ran against George Washington and complained that the only reason Washington was “chosen for everything,” including president, was because “he was taller than anyone else in the room.”

In 1968 President Nixon wanted a running mate who wouldn’t compete with him so the picked an unknown politician, Spiro Agnew. When a reporter asked people about Spiro Agnew, one person asked, “is that a disease?” Another person suggested it was a type of egg.

When Democrat Stephen Douglas called Abraham Lincoln “two-faced” during an election year, Lincoln replied, “If I had another face, do you think I would wear this one?”

George Washington gave the shortest speech, 135 words. William Henry Harrison’s was the longest, 8,445 words. He spoke for over two hours in a heavy snow storm, which made him catch a cold and eventually die from pneumonia one month later.

American astronauts on the ISS can vote in elections from orbit by secure email. Mission Control beams up a digital ballot.

The Anti-Masonic party is known as the first “third party” in the U.S. They held their first national convention in 1832 – in a saloon.

The oldest presidential candidate to be elected is Ronald Reagan at 69 years old. That will be tied or broken this year. Hillary Clinton is 69 and Donald Trump is 70.