Stock market fail: It briefly dropped below 600, though we just missed it. This is worse than Thursday.
Obama is going to give a statement about the downgrade of the U.S. credit rating at 1:30 p.m. You can watch it here.
» It’s becoming more and more apparent that we might be heading for a double-dip recession here. The Dow fell for eight days straight, only ending the losing streak yesterday — but it could fall steeply today. The new jobless numbers are mostly to blame for the weak market. There were 400,000 new unemployment claims in the week that ended July 30. That, in addition to a spreading debt crisis in Europe, has been enough to convince investors that the U.S. economy isn’t in a great spot right now, and it’s hurting our stock market bad.
» The worst result since July 2009: To explain what you’re looking at, this number represents manufacturing activity in July. Any number above 50 percent is growth. Good right? Well, in this case, not really, because the previous month was 55.3 percent. And earlier this year, it was above 60 percent for a few solid months. This number is another sign that the economy is starting to slow down again. This result was so bad that it deflated optimism about the debt deal on the stock market this morning.
The ultimate bad-luck signs: From our boy Zach Seward, a video of The Smurfs ringing the opening bell on the Wall Street this morning. What’s up with the cheesy techno music and dumb effects on the video? And why are The Smurfs so terrible?
Well, as long as he doesn’t drink it. You use Clorox, right? You use it to spray stuff? To disinfect surfaces? To bleach your clothes? Well, Carl Icahn, who doesn’t exactly carry the best reputation for company turnarounds but was a real-life influence for Gordon Gekko (seriously — read up on Trans World Airlines and consider how much it compares to the plot of the original “Wall Street”), recently put up an insane, unsolicited buyout offer for the cleaning-supply country, which (think about this next time you eat a salad) also makes Hidden Valley Ranch salad dressing. Slowly but surely, Icahn became the company’s largest shareholder, and now he’s gunning for a whitewash. We could keep going with these bleach jokes all day, so don’t tempt us. source
» This isn’t a good sign: Generally when a stock has a steep decline immediately after its IPO, it means that the pricing is totally off. In the case of Pandora, the company initially planned to enter the stock market at $7 to $9 per share, but with the current investor fervor over internet companies, the IPO price doubled. Meanwhile, other recently-added tech stocks — LinkedIn and Yandex — have fallen from their peaks, but remain above their IPO prices. In the case of LinkedIn, they’re a solid 52 percent above their IPO price.
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» Another sign of strong investor demand: Pandora’s IPO is more evidence of a growing tech bubble, though Pandora’s on a smaller scale than some of the other companies expected to do an IPO soon. Facebook and Twitter, once they do their IPOs, will likely make this look like a walk in the park. Which makes it understandable why some investors might think that Pandora — which hasn’t turned a profit — might get overshadowed a year or two from now. Pandora also faces some tough business challenges because of their reliance on expensive music licensing — ensuring that that their profit margins remain extremely tight.
» A leaked memo from the CEO is to blame: The memo by Leo Apotheker caused the company’s stocks to fall. He cited the Japanese earthquake and weak PC sales as reasons to reduce hiring and prepare for another rough quarter. Even though their stocks are up from last year, they aren’t meeting market predictions, causing people to sell their shares in the company. Apparently, it’s causing the stock market to slow down overall. Yikes.
General Electric’s impressive profits not impressive enough: Because really, nobody gives a crap that your multi-billion-dollar company has a massive jump in profit. You need to do it with style or go home. (Seriously, does anything impress these investors these days? Does GE’s CEO have to tell investors of the huge jump in profits while walking on his hands and hula-hooping? Because that wold impress us. But would that impress investors?)
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