As one might imagine, investors latched onto this news and took it as a cue to sell the dollar. After seeing gains for the dollar last week, Bullard’s remarks prompted a round of profit taking. Additionally, the comments also helped stocks. Confident that the Fed is willing to continue propping up Wall Street, investors are in a buying mood, sending the stock market higher an hour and a half after opening. The gains do appear to be slowing, though, as day traders swoop in to take their profits from earlier.

However, this week is expected to be a good one for stocks. Investors are hoping that the holiday shopping season, which kicks off with Black Friday the day after Thanksgiving, will help provide some fuel for the fire. With a short trading week, and the news so far good, it looks as though this week, at least, will be a good one for the stock market. We’ll see if it holds if Black Friday turns out to be a disappointment.

Image source: Fletcher6 via Wikimedia Commons

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James Bullard Helps Stocks, Destroys Dollar

Wall Street firms prepare to pay $30 billion in bonuses

Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and Morgan Stanley all received taxpayer help, and made the news due to bonus programs last year — which were enabled in part by the taxpayer help. Now it appears that Wall Street is ready for more. The bonuses are expected to surpass the last high, reached in 2007, before the financial market collapse, of $26.8 billion. And it really doesn’t matter what anyone says. Bloomberg reports on what seems to be the prevailing attitude on Wall Street:

“Wall Street is beginning to resemble Clark Gable as Rhett Butler in the film ‘Gone With the Wind’: ‘Quite frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn,’” Paul Hodgson, a senior research associate on compensation at the Portland, Maine-based Corporate Library, said in an e-mail. “It doesn’t seem as if even political threat, disastrous PR, envy, rising unemployment rates and home repossessions is enough to get any of these people to refuse the bonuses they have ‘earned.’”

Clearly, Wall Street has policy makers nicely sewn up, and populist outrage doesn’t affect Wall Street because it clearly does little to prompt lawmakers to take action. So, while thousands stand in unemployment lines this holiday season, it will be little comfort to know that their Wall Street counterparts are enjoying record bonuses.

Image source: Fletcher6 via Wikimedia Commons

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Wall Street Set to Give Out Record Bonuses

Wall Street is hopeful that policymakers will continue to prop up the big companies, and focus on helping the banking system retain its stability. Investors will also be waiting to see what sorts of the things the Fed is mind for ensuring that the economic growth seen in the third quarter will be sustainable. Also of interest is how Bernanke and the rest of the Federal Reserve members plan to withdraw from the stimulus.

Withdrawing from economic stimulus is an important consideration for many, since it will be a delicate maneuver. If the stimulus measures are in place for too long, we could end up with hyper inflation and a number of other distressing economic problems. On the other hand, if economic stimulus is withdrawn too soon or too quickly, the economic recovery could be in danger, and the chances of a double-dip recession increase. With employment still an issue, and the housing market still reliant on the first time home buyer tax credit, though, it is unlikely that an exit from the stimulus will begin until sometime next year.

Image source: Daylife

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Stocks Heading Higher Ahead of Fed

Stone and Douglas (who won an Oscar for his portrayal of the film’s main charachter, Gordon Gecko) will return in the follow-up.  Shia LaBeouf (Transformers, Disturbia) is in talks to portray Douglas’ protégé (as was originally played by Sheen).

As you can probably guess from the title, Wall Street was about the sometimes shady dealings and corruption among financial traders but the sequel will also take the current economic crisis into consideration.  I’m glad because it not only is sensitive to what the world is experiencing right now but it also gives the movie a “fresh” perspective on the industry and sets it apart from the first film.

Douglas was recently on Ellen and he dished a bit about the film.  “It will be really fun and, it’s a perfect time,” he said on Wednesday’s Ellen DeGeneres Show.  “They had another title, Money Never Sleeps, and then Oliver Stone, who directed the first one, read the new script and said I want to do it and we’re going to call it Wall Street 2.”

“It starts up a couple years ago. Gordon Gekko has just got out of jail, and we kind of deal with all the issues that are going on now,” said Douglas. “It’s an excellent script. I’m really excited about it.”

image: Amazon.com

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“Wall Street” Sequel Coming, LaBeouf in Talks