Visa in Record IPO, Goldman and Lehman Results calm Markets
The Credit card company Visa (V) set a record yesterday for the biggest-ever initial public offering (IPO) in U.S. history, bringing in an estimated $17.3 billion. The company offered 406 million shares at $44 per share, . The company will begin trading on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol V. Goldman Sachs and Lehman reported results yesterday that beat Market expectations but were substantially down on previous quarters reflecting the challenges in the market currently but since expectations were for a lot worse this had the impact of assisting the markets to another 400 point upside yesterday.The Fed helped hugely cutting rates by a huge 0.75% ,this was still below some market expectations of a 1 % cut, the market however rallied on the news.Today we are seeing numerous statements from the likes of Morgan Stanley (MMS) and Goldman Sachs (GS) stating that they took advantage of the Fed discount window, bearing in mind the secret nature of these institutions this can only be seen as blatant PR to try to remove the stigma that would be associated with people finding out that Banks are in need of capital.The thought no doubt being that if the likes of Goldman and Morgan Stanley are using it then it doesn't mean there is a problem. On the contrary my view is that if they did indeed use the window it just goes to show the depth of the problem.
After earlier appearing to probably open to the downside the markets opened slightly to the upside although at the time of writing they are back in negative territory.Rumours in the UK that HBOS(HBOS-LSE) are having liquidity problems-(which they have denied )are keeping the fear in the markets. The dollar is stronger and this is having a negative impact on Gold and Silver, with April Gold futures off 45 points currently . If we see Gold down around the $900 mark then I may consider adding ore to my portfolio. Those of you who read my article on Silver yesterday (Should I buy Silver or Gold ? ) will note that Silver is holding up much better only off 0.13 at $19.71 for the June Futures.
I own both Gold and Silver but as I said yesterday if I was only looking to buy one I believe that Silver has the most catching up to do and that would be the one that I would favour I would use the Silver ETF (SLV) and look to leg in on pullbacks.
Best Wishes
Alan
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