What a Year: Unsatisfying End

So ends 2005, a year in which the price of oil, gold, and Google's (GOOG Quote) stock soared, while the Federal Reserve hiked interest rates by 2%, General Motors (GM Quote) hit 20-plus-year lows, and, presumably, the housing "boom" reached a top.

As the market looks toward 2006, uncertainties abound. Most prominently: Will a cooling housing market take the fizz out of consumption next year and slow the economy (or worse)?

Compounding the mixed results for the year (and dampening optimism for 2006), the yield curve inverted this week, meaning long-term yields have fallen below short-term ones, historically a harbinger of an economic downturn.

The yield of a 10-year Treasury bond settled at 4.40% Friday, barely above the yield of a two-year note at 4.39%.

The yield curve, which plots the yields of short- to long-term bonds, inverted twice in the final week of the year.

Still, the S&P 500 index, at 1249 by Friday's close, ends 2005 pretty much in the middle of the range of where Wall Street strategists said it would at the start of the year.

But since optimism ran high after a strong rally in November, and with signals from the Fed that its 18-month long tightening campaign may be near the end, it's hard to pretend that December was not a disappointment.

A hoped-for Santa Claus rally never materialized, and at the close of trading Friday, the stock market closed the week, the month and the year on a uninspiring note.

On Friday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average 67.32, or 0.62%, to 10,717.50, the S&P 500 dropped 6.13, or 0.49%, to 1248.29, and the Nasdaq Composite dipped 12.84 points, or 0.6%, to 2205.32.

The performance was reflective of the lackluster performance over the holiday shortened week, during the Dow lost 1.6%, the S&P dropped 1.6%, and the Nasdaq dipped 2%.

Beats Losing Money Financial assets, save the Dow, gained in 2005
	December	Fourth quarter	2005
Dow Jones Industrials	-0.6%	1.7%	-0.6%
S&P 500 index	-0.0001%	1.8%	3.%
Nasdaq Composite	-1.2%	3%	1.4%
Russell 2000	0.6%	0.9%	3.4%
10-Yr Treasury bond Yield	down 11 basis points	Up 1 basis point	Up 17 basis points
Crude oil	6.5%	-8.6%	42%
Gold	4.8%	9.9%	19%
Source: TheStreet.com