Stocks Down on Greece, Bank Issues

The Markets

There were just two simple reasons for stocks to start out the week as miserably as they did: banks and Greece.

Naturally, there's more to it than just that, though those two catalysts have been driving the markets - in one direction or the other - for about the past year-and-a-half. There was also the concept, disclosed here on Friday, that last week's five-day rally was based upon pure nothingness, much like our fiat American currency. Coming at the end of options expiration, the market action for the week was completely suspect, and today market participants were treated to the big winners squaring their books.

But fears of a Greek default (it will happen. It must, because Greece is broke.) and its effects on the banking community worldwide clearly pushed Eurpean stocks lower and so too with US indices. The Dow dove more than 250 points in the early going, taking the rest of the market down with it. Of course, there was the obligatory, short-covering, melt-up rally at 3:00 pm, which cut the day's losses roughly in half, but today will look like a picnic compared to what's on the event horizon in the not-so-distant future.

That's really it. There was no real substantive news of any kind, outside of President Obama droning on about taxing the rich in a morning speech. The markets continue to experience great stress, but if the banks in this country are feeling the pain, all one can say is that it couldn't happen to a more-deserving group.

In news you won't see covered in any depth by the mainstream media, Ron Paul took the California Republican Party straw poll by a landslide, winning 44.9% of the vote, and seven are arrested during third day of Wall Street protests.

The latter story was reported by Bloomberg, and, as much as we like the company founded by the current New York mayor, they're still a bit outside the establishment mainstream of the large TV network apparatus.

Dow 11,401.01, -108.08 (0.94%)
NASDAQ 2,612.83, -9.48 (0.36%)
S&P 500 1,204.09, -11.92 (0.98%)
NYSE Composite 7,234.63, -113.55 (1.55%)
NASDAQ Volume 1,900,534,375
NYSE Volume 4,224,766,500
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ Advance - Decline: 1497-5053
Combined NYSE & NASDAQ New highs - New lows: 47-185
WTI crude oil: 85.70, -2.26
Gold: 1778.50, -34.00
Silver: 39.65, -1.01