1/20/10

Good morning. Yesterday was pretty quiet in the markets. Today we have had a flurry of news. U.S. Housing Starts unexpectedly fell in December, pulled down by a lack of activity for single-family dwellings. Starts for single-family homes fell last month, but multifamily starts were up over 12%. The Producer Price Index was up for the third month in a row, versus expectations of being unchanged. The core rate, ex-food & energy, was unchanged, lower than expected.
But perhaps more important than the economic news were the earning results this morning. Morgan Stanley earned $413 million in the 4th quarter, but it was still below estimates. Wells Fargo swung to a profit in the fourth quarter on net income of $2.82 billion, versus Bank of America’s loss of $5.2 billion due to taking a hit from higher credit costs and TARP repayments. And the Bank of New York Mellon profit beat estimates, hitting almost $600 million.
Rates are unchanged this morning.