Greenspan Sparks Massive Afternoon Rally
To the stock market, sometimes he's a villain, sometimes he's a hero.
Today,
Federal Reserve
Chairman
Alan Greenspan
, of "irrational exuberance" fame, was a hero on Wall Street.
Unofficially, the
Dow Jones Industrial Average
ended up 257.21, or 3.3%, to 8154.41. The
S&P 500
jumped 36.46, or 3.5%, to 1066.09, the
Nasdaq Composite Index
surged 62.47, or 3.7%, to 1760.27 and the
Russell 2000
rose 7.76, or 2.1%, to 376.00.
Meanwhile, with the strength in stocks today, the long end of the Treasury curve fell. The 30-year Treasury bond was recently down 8/32 to 105 1/32, yielding 5.17%.
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Stocks were sharply higher through much of the session as the Street hoped Greenspan would hint -- in his Greenspanly way -- at a rate cut in his testimony before the
Senate Budget Committee
.
He didn't disappoint.
The major stock gauges popped modestly after headlines taken from the chairman's prepared text hit the news wires, then eased off, before rising steadily through the rest of the session and into the close.
Also appearing with Greenspan was Deputy Treasury Secretary
Lawrence Summers
. They were still testifying before the panel after the closing bell.
In other news, creation of the world's biggest financial-services company got the official okey-dokey today from the Fed. The Fed conditionally approved the merger between
Travelers
(TRV) - Get The Travelers Companies Inc. Report
and
Citicorp
(CCI) - Get Crown Castle International Corp. (REIT) Report
. Travelers rose 3 2/16 to 42 13/16, while Citicorp was up 10 7/8 to 106.
Breadth, to say the least, was good.
On the
New York Stock Exchange
, 2,357 advancers led 779 decliners on 902.9 million shares.
Nasdaq Stock Market
winners beat losers 2,698 to 1,442 on 933.2 million shares.
On the NYSE, 105 issues hit new 52-week lows while 63 hit new highs. On the Nasdaq, 147 issues were at new lows while new highs totaled 43.
Market data above are preliminary. Updated numbers and analysis will follow in the Market Roundup
.
