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Dow Jones Today: At the closing bell, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 40.39 points to finish at 16,573.00. The Nasdaq increased 8.42 points, finishing at 4,276.46, while the S&P 500 climbed 5.38 points to finish at 1,890.90.
Here's a recap of other major events today:
- A Shaky Recovery: International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde warned investors and central bankers today that the global economy faces "years of slow and subpar growth." The IMF director increased calls for central banks to more aggressively spur growth. Lagarde stated that risks like low inflation in Europe, market volatility, and geopolitical tensions in Ukraine and Venezuela could stall the global recovery. The IMF now projects that global growth in 2014 will be above 3%; however, the U.S. economy is still trickling along below that target. Most of the global growth will continue to come from Asian emerging markets, which are expected to increase by 6.5%. China, despite its currency and trade concerns, will increase at 7.5% in 2014, according to the IMF.
- Jeff Bezos Starts the Fire: The television wars heated up again today as Amazon.com Inc. (Nasdaq: AMZN) unveiled its new TV streaming box called "Fire TV." The device allows users to stream movies and television shows from their Prime accounts, while accessing additional apps like Netflix Inc. (Nasdaq: NFLX) and Hulu. Fire TV also offers viewing apps from Walt Disney Co.'s (NYSE: DIS) ESPN and CBS Corp.'s (NYSE: CBS) Showtime to anyone with a cable or satellite subscription. The initial sales price is $99 and is now available online. With Amazon's dominance in new markets, our Michael Robinson suggests that its CEO Jeff Bezos is one of the five executives in tech industry who can make you rich...
- Capital Flight: It's a bad time to be Bill Gross and PIMCO. Investors pulled another net $3.1 billion from the company's flagship Pimco Total Return Fund in March. Morningstar data states that it is the 11th consecutive month of outflows from the world's largest bond fund. Since May 2013, investors have pulled more than $52.1 billion from the fund, according to Morningstar. Reuters states that the fund's performance lagged behind 95% of its peers due to a number of poor positions and decisions by Gross over the last year.
This next major event in the market today is one of the most profitable stories of the year...
About the Author
Garrett Baldwin is a globally recognized research economist, financial writer, and consultant with degrees from Northwestern, Johns Hopkins, Purdue, and Indiana University. He is a seasoned financial and political risk analyst, with a focus on stocks, hedge funds, private equity, blockchain, and housing policy. He has conducted risk assessment projects for clients in 27 countries, and consulted on policy and financial operations for some of the nation's largest financial institutions, including a $1.5 trillion credit fund, a $43 billion credit and auto loan giant, as well as two of the largest Wall Street banks by assets under management.
Garrett joined Money Map Press as an economist and researcher in 2011, specializing in alternative strategies with an emphasis on fundamental and technical analysis.