每日市場點評 --- June 3, 2008

The market continued to lose ground amid renewed concern over financial industry. All three major indices closed the session lower although they were well off their intraday trough. The news on the economic front was actually better than expected. The factory orders for April unexpected jumped 1.1% following an upward revised 1.5% gain in the previous month. In addition, books also increased at a healthy rate of 2.6%. The better-than-expected factory orders report again shows a weak US dollar is making US-made goods more attractive to foreign buyers. Interestingly, the Fed Chairman Bernanke also made some comments regarding the US dollar and it is quite a rare event for the Fed Chairman to do so because that is usually the responsibility for the Secretary of the Treasury. Following Bernanke’s comments, the US dollar immediately reversed its early weakness and moved higher against the euro and the yen. However, a strong US dollar along with more than $3 plunge in the crude price was not enough to offset the negative sentiment caused by worries in the financial industry.

Although some issues such as Lehman Brothers and Wachovia tumbled badly during today’s session, the overall financial sector fared relatively well and was off fractionally at the close. Energies were among the biggest losers as a result of lower oil price. The CRB commodity index ended the session lower by about 1.5%. Treasuries, on the other hand, continued to rally due to flight-to-quality trading. The VIX moved higher for the second day in a row and now is above 20. The market breath was somewhat better than yesterday but volume was also on the heavy side.