General Electric (GE) missed its first quarter estimates this morning. The mega conglomerate cited the slowing economy as the main factor, and that it virtually drained the company's financial services  business. The company reported EPS of 44 cents, which was well below the 51 cents that earnings tracker Thomson First Call analysts had been expecting to see. This is an 8% drop from the same period last year. Revenue was up a ...

Oil prices have continued their recent surge following this week's inventory report from the Energy Department. Oil has jumped $2.65 to $111.15, and are very close to hitting its historic all time high of $111.80. Prices moved up as high as $111.43 immediately following today's report. The market had been pretty flat for most of this morning, in anticipation of today's report. What we have seen is a drop of oil ...

March was another tough month for employees, as recession fears in America led to 80,000 jobs being slashed across the country. Looking at total unemployment, the unemployment rate for the country rose from 4.8% up to 5.1%. This could be one of the biggest signals that the country has already been contracting. This is the highest rate that the country has seen since back in September 2005 when the country was ...

This morning we were seeing the markets in the red, but they were given a bit of relief following Fed Chaiman Ben Bernanke's testimony to Congress today. Ironically, it was Bernanke himself that had initially put the markets into the red when he stated that there was a decent chance that the U.S. economy would contract during the first half of this year. With all the recession rumors and fears floating ...

Consumer confidence has fallen to levels that we have not seen for nearly 35 years. According to the Confidence Board, consumer confidence in March has dropped to 64.5, a level not seen since the Nixon administration. There are three main factors contributing to the erosion of consumer confidence currently; falling stock prices, falling home values, and finally... the dollar setting record lows against the euro. It seems like everyday we turn ...

Wall Street has been rallying today, and enjoying the strong start to the week is Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE: WMT), which hit a new 52 week high in today's action. The stock traded up as high as $54.15, and is currently trading up 1.3% to $53.95. The past few months have been a little rocky for investors, as traders have been trying to deal with a weak housing market, a falling ...

After a tough day yesterday, futures are looking OK this morning and we should be set for a positive open this morning. It has been a roller coaster week that saw the DOW rise 420 points on Tuesday, and the follow that up with a drop of 300 points in yesterday's market. Helping this morning is a strong earnings report out of shoe and apparel giant Nike Inc. (NYSE: NKE) which ...

Oil prices have been dropping today after we were given a bearish inventory report from the U.S. Department of Energy. Going into today's report the market had been expecting to see another rise in inventories and that is exactly what it was given. While the increase was lesser than had been expected, it was enough to catapult prices much lower this afternoon. Analysts had been expecting to see an increase of ...

Ford Motor (NYSE: F), already troubled, is set to get off to a weak start this morning after the auto maker was downgraded this morning by broker Citigroup. The broker downgraded the stock this morning from a "hold" to a "sell" rating. Citigroup cited several reasons for the downgrade, and in addition lowered its price target on the stock from $7.00 down to $5.50. Here a few of the reasons for the ...

Today looks like another rough one for the NASDAQ after tech giant Cisco Systems (NASDAQ: CSCO) warned that  this year. The company reported fiscal Q2 earnings of 38 cents per share, which was in line with analyst estimates, but where the problems come in, is that the company warned that recession fears may weigh on the company for the next couple of quarters. Wall Street had been looking to see the company ...