TSC Weekender: Markets Up Despite Rate Hike

THE PULSE Where TSC feels the market's beat. MORE THE TRADER'S TONGUE JJC translates Street-speak. MORE

There wasn't the profit-taking we predicted this Friday in advance of Oscar pool betting. Either people find the markets more compelling than the American Beauty/Cider House Rules cliffhanger or nobody feels lucky. Or perhaps those traders holding stocks over the weekend are swingtrading, a strategy discussed during this Saturday's Personal Finance Focus. Self-employed workers can't afford to miss Tracy Byrnes' Tax Forum, which walks through Schedule C -- the form they all must file. And on the lighter side, Easy Money mulls the creative spelling that dot-coms employ when naming themselves. Got any questions? Remember to visit our new Idiot Box Index, where we list previously answered queries about taxes, trading and the markets.

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What goes up will mostly likely keep going up, Alan Greenspan be damned. In accordance with expectations, Tuesday the Federal Reserve nudged up the federal funds rate -- the interest rate at which banks lend to each other overnight -- to 6% from 5.75%, or 25 basis points. And in contradiction to expectations, the markets surged. The S&P sprung 37.19, or 2.6%, to 1493.82 -- a record level -- supported by tech bellwethers, financials, drugmakers and airlines.

Thursday followed with the Dow Jones Industrial Average summiting 11,000 for the first time since Feb. 3 by climbing 253.16 to 11,119.86, short-roped by strong earnings indications. The Nasdaq also hopped up 75.94, or 1.6%, to 4940.69. Friday the Dow closed at 11,112.72, down 7.14, or 0.06%. The Nasdaq finished up 22.42, or 0.45%, at 4963.03.

The Federal Open Markets Committee said that it sees the threat of inflation as more pressing than the specter of slowing economic growth. That is, nothing's changed since it last met in February. Some believe that the Fed's rate hikes could be drawing to a close and that sentiment encouraged the market. Others were left scratching their heads and attributed it to the money sloshing around in the market. Some even considered the unthinkable: Could it be that Greenspan has lost his footing as powerful Zeus of the market, with his mighty thunderbolt and briefcase?

Kayte VanScoy, special to the TheStreet.com, contributed to this article.

Reader David Repshinska writes, "Lend me some knowledge stored in your vat. I've heard of a company announcing a tender offer for shares of its stock. What's a tender offer and why do companies do them? How do they affect shareholders? This involves a company that is near 52-week lows." David, in business as in love, tender offerings are complicated affairs that have less to do with emotions and more to do with cash. MORE Enter the Idiot Box, where all your pesky little questions will be treated with kind condescension. As your fifth-grade teacher used to say, everybody else wants to know the answer, too. Please do send your queries.

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