Good morning. Premarket futures are weak this morning as fear increases that the credit crisis is spreading.
We not only have comments by Boston Fed Member Rosengren who said that the problems are now starting to spill-over to Main Street. But, more importantly, default notices from Thornburg Mortgage and a Carlyle Group bond fund, as well as expectations of even more writedowns from UBS among others, have weighed on sentiment.
In other news, a couple of datapoints on the jobs market came in slightly better than expected. Both initial jobless claims were less than anticipated and the Monster Employment Index was stronger. In addition, several retailers, including Wal-Mart, posted better than expected same-store sales for February.
Premarket gainers: UFPT, SMSI, FLOW, TSRA, DXPE, EXAS, URBN, MATK, BBI, WMT, TGT, ORCL, SONS, MELI, EPCT, TASR, PLCE, NVTL, CSIQ, and PBT.
Premarket losers: TMA, UDRL, ABK, ANH, CMO, CWTR, AEO, GPS, ZUMZ, MFA, PETM, MR, MER, FFIV, NLY, ESLR, STEC, JCP, USMO, AOB, and ERIC.
At 10:00AM we have the pending home sales for January and lots of Fedspeak throughout the day while we wait for Friday's jobs report. There is also lots of chatter that new bailout plans will be announced over the next few days to improve sentiment. Oil prices will also play a role as traders try to take advantage of the recent breakout.
Like yesterday, we have lots of noise to sort through while we await tomorrow's jobs data. Put in the earplugs and go make it a great day!
