Wall Street spends entire day in the red

Weak economic reports remind investors once again about recession

stocks at Wall Street ended with losses on Tuesday, 14 day, 10 April, 2009. Financial stocks were under pressure since the opening bell, and led losses in the broader market. The sector's downturn came amid a $5 billion common equity offering from Goldman Sachs. Other than this, came a weak batch of economic data which has also led to today's depressed market sentiment.

After opening 70 points lower earlier during the day, The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended lower by 137 points at 7,920. The Nasdaq Composite Index, ended lower by 27 points at 1,625. S&P 500 ended lower by 17 points at 841.

All ten sectors posted a loss today led by financial sector. Healthcare sector showed good strength today after better-than-expected earnings announcement and a reaffirmed outlook came from Johnson & Johnson.

Among major economic reports for the day, The Commerce Department reported today that U.S. retail sales dropped a seasonally adjusted 1.1% in March after two months of gains had boosted hopes of a rebound in consumer spending. Sales fell in March for almost every type of store except the necessities of food and drugs.

Retail sales in the first quarter were down 1.2% compared with the fourth quarter of last year, raising the possibility that real consumer spending may have fallen again in the first three months of 2009 after plunging at a 4% annual rate in the final six months of 2008.

In a separate report, the Labor Department said producer prices fell 1.2% in March, much more than the 0.5% decline expected. Core prices - which exclude food and energy were unchanged. Producer prices are down 3.5% in the past year, the largest decline in wholesale prices since 1950.

February business inventories decreased 1.3%, which is generally in-line with the 1.2% decline that was expected. Inventories also decreased 1.3% in the prior month.

Transportation stocks garnered positive interest after J.B. Hunt posted better-than-expected quarterly results. Increased confidence in the industry took the Dow Jones Transportation Index up.

Crude oil fell once again as traders anticipated that crude inventories rose more thane expected this week. Discouraging retail sales data also reminded traders once again regarding recession. Yesterday, the International Energy Agency had lowered its forecast for this year's global oil demand.

On Tuesday, crude-oil futures for light sweet crude for May delivery closed at $49.41/barrel (lower by $0.64 or 0.6%) on the New York Mercantile Exchange. During intra day trading, it rose to a high of $51.12. Last week, crude ended lower by 0.5%.

Earning reports expected tomorrow are of Abbott Labs along with a host of other companies. Economic data will also be in focus, with March CPI, and April Empire Manufacturing due at 8:30ET, followed by March capacity utilization and industrial production at 9:15ET. In addition, the Fed will release its anecdotal collection of economic information, the Beige Book, at 14:00ET. The weekly crude inventories report is set for release at 10:30ET.