Today's markets should have taken a cue from Mark Twain's famous quip: "Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect." Instead, the S&P 500 (IINDEX: ^GSPC) was surprised by the Obamacare ruling and fell sharply after the news broke, only to recover at the end of the day for a loss of only 0.21%. Conventional wisdom held that the controversial mandate in today's Supreme Court ruling seemed doomed, while many expected the rest of the law to remain. Even most Democrats disliked the mandate, and a majority of analysts expected the court to overturn it; yet, it remained fully intact.
Jobless claims also spiked last week, up 6,000 to 386,000. Across the pond, European leaders provided no real news for the market to digest. As expected, they approved Cyprus' bailout, and failed to agree on tackling the crisis. Few were surprised that German Chancellor Angela Merkel "was very adamant about the fact she isn’t going to give an inch or two," as Fred Dickson, chief market strategist at D.A. Davidson and Co. reported. However, late reports indicating some positives from the summit almost brought the markets back to even.
On a volatile day like today, the large financials in the Dow Jones Industrial Average took the hardest hit. JP Morgan
Elsewhere in the S&P, Chipotle
Finally, Dell
It was a crazy day overall for the markets. Investors fled after mixed news in the morning, then seemed to think that they overreacted, and brought the markets nearly even. It was another day of unpredictability that we’ll probably continue to witness in the foreseeable future.
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