Trump Presser A Non-Event; America Awaits Inauguration

Though widely-anticipated as a market moving event, President-Elect Donald J. Trump's press conference at 11;00 ET today was more or less an exercise in sell the hype, buy the news.

Trump handled questions about the "fake news" Russian dossiers widely circulated by CNN and other outlets and quickly dismissed them as nonsense. The audacious level of mendacity displayed by the mainstream media in the run-up to the inauguration of America's 45th president has been unconscionable and unprecedented, but the Donald managed to deflect any potential harm as the media and intelligence community reports have been devoid of facts or proof of their veracity.

Other than waving off and refusing to take questions from anybody from CNN, Trump laid out basically the same nebulous outlines upon which he campaigned, without getting too specific. Thus, what the market wanted was not what they received, but traders were assuaged by the one-hour appearance and resumed trading within the prevailing range of the past month, between 19,800 and 19,999.

If the market seems moribund, it's likely the result of non-specifics from the soon-to-be-sitting president, meaning this regime of up-down-up-down may persist through the next week, culminating in next Friday's inauguration.

Otherwise, it was another uneventful day, with the Dow still planted just south of 20K.

At the Close 1.11.16
Dow: 19,954.28, +98.75 (0.50%)
NASDAQ: 5,563.65, +11.83 (0.21%)
S&P 500: 2,275.32, +6.42 (0.28%)
NYSE Composite: 11,221.92, +38.59 (0.35%)