Huh?
Things are slowly going sideways and people MAKING MONEY. gambling on stocks?
Right now?
It’a about a vaccine going out for testing with tens of thousands people…
And Trump’s dream that everything will quickly right itself….
Buoyed by heightened activity in the markets, Goldman Sachsreported its highest bond-trading revenue in nine years, helping it to deliver a solidly profitable quarter despite increased costs and a slowdown in other areas of its business.
Revenue spiked in Goldman’s trading area, more than doubling the unit’s performance from a year ago, and rose dramatically in its investment-banking business. Overall, the firm’s revenue for the second quarter was $13.3 billion, a 41 percent upswing from the same period last year. Its earnings were $2.4 billion, essentially the same as a year ago.
During the quarter, compensation costs rose substantially, as did other expenses that were not specified, perhaps reflecting an increasing set-aside for future legal costs. That theme has been borne out by other large banks this week, whose quarterly profits plunged as they stowed away money to protect them from future losses.
Stocks rose on Wednesday, rallying after a drugmaker reported promising, but early-stage, progress in its candidate for a coronavirus vaccine, and data on industrial production added to evidence of the economy’s recovery.
The S&P 500 jumped about 1 percent at the start of trading. Markets in Frankfurt, Paris and London were also up by more than 1 percent, after a mixed day in Asia.
Oil prices were also higher, on a day when major producers are meeting to consider easing restrictions on output. The production curbs were approved in April when the industry was facing a calamitous fall in oil demand, and any relaxing of the rules would signal stronger energy markets.
The gains were largely spurred by news from the biotech company Moderna, based in Cambridge, Mass., which said an experimental drug provoked a positive immune response and appeared safe among the first 45 people who received it. It is the first coronavirus vaccine to be tested in humans, and Moderna’s shares were sharply higher.
Policymakers and economists have long predicted that a complete recovery in growth depends on the development of a vaccine, and investors have been quick to respond to even the slightest signs of progress toward one.
On Wednesday, the rally was led by companies that have the most to gain from a return to pre-pandemic levels of travel and tourism. American Airlines, Expedia, Marriott and Wynn Resorts — which have become a proxy for the market’s enthusiasm about a rebound — were all among the best performing stocks in the S&P 500….
image…Amr Alfiky/The New York Times