BLBG: U.S. Stocks Swing Between Gains, Losses; GM Rises, Exxon Falls
By Elizabeth Stanton
Nov. 28 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. stocks drifted between gains and losses on the final day of the market’s best week in three decades as speculation that government bailouts will shore up the economy offset concern over waning demand for computer products and energy.
Citigroup Inc., which had $306 billion in troubled assets guaranteed by the government last weekend, climbed for a fourth day. General Motors Corp., which will make its case for federal rescue funds next week, jumped 11 percent. Intel Corp., the world’s largest chipmaker, lost as much as 1.5 percent after European rival STMicroelectronics NV said sales may decrease. Exxon Mobil Corp. slipped more than 1 percent as slowing demand for oil overshadowed potential cuts in production by OPEC.
“We are in a very anomalous situation where you get these enormous, sharp, short-covering rallies and then it falls off again,” Gavin Graham, director of investments at Bank of Montreal Asset Management in Toronto, said on Bloomberg Television. “It would be fair to assume that in a year’s time we’ll be substantially higher than we are now.”
The S&P 500 slipped 0.4 percent to 884.53 at 9:59 a.m. in New York. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 6.14 points, or 0.1 percent, to 8,732.75, while the Nasdaq Composite Index lost 1.1 percent to 1,515.61.
The S&P 500 surged almost 11 percent this week as the Federal Reserve committed as much as $800 billion to help resuscitate lending markets and investors speculated President- elect Barack Obama’s economic team will bolster growth. The index has still tumbled 44 percent from its October 2007 record as credit-related losses and writedowns at global financial companies approach $1 trillion.
U.S. exchanges were shut yesterday for the Thanksgiving holiday and will close at 1 p.m. today.
Weekly Performance
This week’s rally in U.S. stocks helped push the MSCI World Index of 23 developed markets up 11 percent since Nov. 21, the steepest weekly advance since data began in 1970.
Europe’s Dow Jones Stoxx 600 Index swung between gains and losses after rising for four straight days. STMicroelectronics said fourth-quarter revenue and gross margin will miss forecasts after a slowdown in demand from the wireless, automotive and computer peripherals industries.
To contact the reporters on this story: Elizabeth Stanton in New York at estanton@bloomberg.net
