Sleep
Marcelo Braga/Flickr
And we thought yesterday was quiet.
First the scoreboard:
Dow: 13,165, -10.4, -0.0%
S&P 500: 1,402, +0.5, +0.0%
NASDAQ: 3,018, +7.3, +0.2%
And now the top stories:
  • Overnight, China released a ton of economic data.  In a nutshell, most measures reflected a slowing economy.  However,inflation continues to cool off, which opens the door for more easing by China's monetary authorities.  

  • Greece reported that its unemployment rate climbed to 23.1 percent in May from 22.6 in April.  The youth unemployment rate is at a horrifying 54.9 percent.  But no one is surprised by bad news out of Greece these days.

  • What was surprising was Greek industrial production, which unexpectedly climbed by 0.3 percent.  The Twitter vigilantes were all a twitter.  But the conclusion seems to be that this is just a blip in data that'll continue to deteriorate.

  • In the U.S., weekly initial jobless claims fell to 361k from 367k a week ago.  This was well below the 370k that economists were expecting.

  • One thing that probably should've gotten more attention was corn prices, which surged to an all-time high of $8.22 per bushel.  According to a new report from the UN, food prices around the world are up 6 percent.  Meanwhile, food reserves are at a 4-year low.