Government Shutdown, Day Two: Nobody Cares, Stocks Higher; Gold, Silver Up, Crude Oil, Gas Prices Lower

In September and August 2000, the dividend yield on the S&P 500 fell to an all-time low of 1.11%. As of September 30, that figure is 1.19%.

In layman's terms, that means if you invested in a company with that kind of yield, outside of gains in the share price, it would take about 84 years to get your money back. If one were to reinvest the dividends annually, it might lower the time period to about 58 years. Naturally, one would hope the stock increased in value by many multiples over that period of time.

The average share of stock traded on the NYSE is held for something like 17 minutes. Dividend yield matters only to people or institutions with extremely long investment horizons, but this extremely low level of dividend yield for S&P stocks only serves to feed into the theory that stocks are completely, brazenly, overvalued and this is the largest ever bubble that's ever existed.

In the current environment, dividends don't matter.

The Bloomberg market wrap headline after Wednesday's close: Stocks Hit Record as Traders Shrug Off US Shutdown. That pretty much says it all. This government "shutdown", of whatever one wishes to call it, is a very large charade, engineered by the very people elected by the U.S. citizenry to keep the government operational and providing benefits to the country.

OK, you can stop laughing now. Everybody knows that congress and the president are more interested in passing legislation that benefits themselves first, their cronies and campaign contributors second, and Joe and Jane Sixpack, last. Whatever it is they (the uniparty) expect to accomplish with this deep state deep fake, Wall Street seems to be all in favor of it, because, rather than selling stocks in a kind of safety trade, stocks hit record highs on Day 1 of the Great Government Shutdown of 2025.

So, when people working in the private sector recieve their paychecks today, tomorrow, or next week, they need to ask these stupid questions:

1. If the government is shut down, where does the tax taken out of my paycheck go?

2. Under what authority are they taking money out of my paycheck?

Answers:

1. Nobody knows.

2. You let them.

There are no stupid questions; just stupid people asking.

Day Two of the government shutdown starts with stock futures diverging, though the NASDAQ futures are soaring, up 140 points at 8:30 am ET. S&P futures are up 17, while Dow futures are down 21.

Gold and silver essentially treaded water overnight. Earlier this morning, gold trade as high as $3,916.80 on the COMEX and silver hit $47.80. WTI crude has been beaten down recently, reflecting revisions by the EIA showing a sizable glut of crude on the market and OPEC raising production quotas. WTI dipped briefly below $61/barrel this morning and is trading just above that level an hour prior to the cash open for stocks.

Gas prices around the U.S. are slightly higher today, skewed by the West coast states of California, Oregon, and Washington, which are all averaging over $4.00. If those are excluded the national average - today at $3.16 - would be under $3.00. States in the Southeast, in particular, have been below $3.00 for a year or longer. When WTI finally catches down into the 50s, gas prices in places like Mississippi and Oklahoma may fall below $2 per gallon.

Despite claims of the horrors of a government shutdown, nothing seemed to change noticeably on Wednesday nor early Thursday morning. There were no plane crashes other than a runway collision at low speed, no injuries other than the aircraft, at LaGuardia Wednesday night. Mail was delivered mostly on time. Amtrak trains ran late, as usual. Social Security checks went out, food stamps were redeemed around the country.

The Government Shutdown of 2025 has the potential of receiving the "nothingburger" moniker, except for Trump threatening to permanently fire hundreds of thousands of useless, non-essential government workers "in a day or two" according to the White House. Democrats don't seem particularly interested in getting the government re-opened any time soon.

Wall Street is juiced again over AI, the hype machine working overtime. Trillions are going into technology. Apparently, the billionaire oligarchs believe AI will bring massive improvements to humanity.

Green lights, everywhere. What could go wrong?

At the Close, Wednesday, October 1, 2025:
Dow: 46,441.10, +43.21 (+0.09%)
NAADAQ: 22,755.16, +95.15 (+0.42%)
S&P 500: 6,711.20, +22.74 (+0.34%)
NYSE Composite: 21,640.00, +75.46 (+0.35%)