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Stocks opened this morning with a surprise from the People’s Bank of China. Although a holiday is Asia has kept Hong Kong’s Seng and China’s Shanghai Composite closed, it did not keep the Central Bank from announucing a quarter percentage point hike to it’s one-year deposit and lending rates. The new benchmark one-year lending rate is 6.31%. China was not the only country to make headlines today. Just two weeks after the resignation of Portugal’s Prime Minister, Moody’s downgraded Portugal’s debt from A3 to Baa1 with reports of uncertainty in the political outlook of the country. The European Central Bank is set to meet on Thursday and investors will look for further details from the meeting to assist in gauging the situation abroad. Concerns abroad are offset today as a merger in the semiconductor sector has given a boost to the market with news that Texas Instruments will reportedly pay $6.5 billion for National Semiconductor increasing it’s shares from $14 to $25. Unfortunately the news has been overshadowed by the implications of a rebalancing of the Nasdaq 100 index. The rebalance is expected to take effect on May 2 and will reduce Apple’s weight close to 40%. The index will increase weight to Google, Intel, Microsoft and Oracle while reducing Apple’s weight from 20% to 12%. The Federal Reserve released it’s minutes from the March 15th policy meeting this afternoon. The minutes confirmed that in June, as planned, the Fed will wind down it’s asset buying program and raised speculation that interest rates may be raised in the future amid rising inflation. At close the major market indexes continue to trend mixed. The Dow dropped 6.13 points or 0.05% to 12393.90. The Nasdaq gained 2.00 points or 0.07% to 2791.19. The S&P 500 decreased by 0.24 or 0.02% to 1332.63. The U.S. Treasuries 10-year yield gained 0.06 to 3.49%. Oil decreased by 0.62 to $107.85 a barrel. The U.S. dollar declined by 0.0001 to the Euro. Author: Pamela Frost
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