U.S. stocks rise as Boehner, Obama fuel optimism on talks

“U.S. stocks rose, erasing an earlier loss for the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index, after comments by Speaker of the House John Boehner and President Barack Obama fueled optimism an agreement can be reached in budget talks,” Inyoung Hwang reports for Bloomberg. “The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index climbed 0.4 percent to 1,404.10 at 2:10 p.m. in New York, after erasing a decline of as much as 1 percent. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 69.24 points, or 0.5 percent, to 12,947.37 today. Trading in S&P 500 companies was 5.6 percent below the 30-day average at this time of day, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.”

“Equities reversed declines as Boehner, an Ohio Republican, said he is optimistic lawmakers engaged in budget talks can ‘avert this crisis sooner rather than later,'” Hwang reports. “He made his remarks to reporters, while saying he continues to oppose the expiration of tax cuts for top earners and Democrats need to get “serious” on budget cuts. Obama said separately at the White House, ‘My hope is to get this done before Christmas.'”

Hwang reports, “The S&P 500 has declined 1.7 percent since Obama was re- elected on Nov. 6 as he seeks a budget agreement with the Republican-controlled House. The deal is aimed at avoiding $607 billion of automatic tax increases and spending cuts that come into effect next year. Sales of new U.S. homes dropped 0.3 percent to a 368,000 annual pace following a revised 369,000 rate in September that was weaker than initially reported, figures from the Commerce Department showed today in Washington… ‘The market is at the mercy of the fiscal cliff until we get some sort of resolution,’ Liz Ann Sonders, the New York- based chief investment strategist at Charles Schwab Corp., which has $1.9 trillion in client assets, said by phone.”

Read more in the full article here.

[Thanks to MacDailyNews readers too numerous to mention individually for the heads up.]

48 Comments

  1. Whatever deal they come up with, unless it includes “real” spending cuts, by the elimination of government agencies and jobs and entitlement reform, it will accomplish absolutely nothing.. probably less than nothing..

      1. Every single time that you hear Obama talking about taxing “the rich,” please remember that Obama is playing a game, manipulating ignorant pawns who voted for him, or for free Obamaphones, or food stamps, or for whatever handout or pet issue they think matters.

        Do the math:

        Raising taxes on everybody in the U.S. making over making over $1 million a year to 30% like Obama wants generates $46.7 billion over the next 10 years (source: non-partisan United States Congress Joint Committee on Taxation). Or $4.67 billion per year on average.

        The estimated $46.7 billion would reduce by 0.7% the $6.4 trillion increase in spending over the next 10 years estimated by the Congressional Budget Office, based on Obama’s 2013 budget plan. The 2013 budget proposed by the Obama administration stated that the “Buffett Rule” should replace the Alternative Minimum Tax. The Joint Committee on Taxation calculated that the Buffett Rule plus the repeal of the Alternative Minimum Tax would increase the deficit by $793.3 billion in the next 10 years.

        The U.S. debt is currently $16.164 trillion. That’s trillion. With a “T.” Obama’s “plan” (class warfare) generates just $46.7 billion over 10 years (before you subtract the negative impact on the economy of job creators not creating as many, or any, jobs, or even deciding to leave the U.S. altogether).

        1. Once again, your ideological clinging to discredited right wing social ideology is without intellectual merit.

          There are many reasons why this economy is stalled. The main reason is the financial meltdown of 2007-2009. CRIMINALS stole yours and my money. But that’s okay with you.

          George Bush plunged us into 2 unnecessary wars to the cost of $2 trillion. Oddly, that $2 trillion is about the level of the current debt.

          When faced with the choice of social programs that benefit society (also known as Social Contracts), vs letting cash accumulate amongst the richest of the rich, I will choose option A.

          You are a shill for the super rich. You don’t know them, they could care less about you. You do their bidding when you insist that balanced budgets and no spending and l;ow taxers equate to anything resembling a growth economy. The sad truth is that no one passes up a good investment based on tax implications. There’s always a way to avoid taxes.

          It matters not what the debt is. It’s your ability to pay it that matters. Shrinking the government (and by implication the economy) does not produce stability.

          Go back to your Ayn Rand.

          BTW- the last election clearly indicates that the populace wants solutions without draconian ideological rhetoric.

        2. It’s ironic that you hit First 2014 over the head with your ideology stick but he at least provided numbers to assert his claims. You on the other hand were the one spouting ideology. Don’t give me that bs about the election signaling the populace wanting solutions. No, what the populace wanted was status quo – free food, free healthcare, free retirement, free birth control, free phones, etc. etc. . If the populace wanted solutions, it wouldn’t have reelected Obama.

        3. When confronted with facts and they have nothing else, they revert to Alinsky like Pavlovian dogs. Watch Rachel Maddow for 5 minutes and you’ll see every one of the Rules for Radicals deployed.

          In this case above, tbone tries out:

          RULE 5: “Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon.” There is no defense. It’s irrational. It’s infuriating. It also works as a key pressure point to force the enemy into concessions.

          RULE 6: “A good tactic is one your people enjoy.” They’ll keep doing it without urging and come back to do more. They’re doing their thing, and will even suggest better ones.

          RULE 10: “If you push a negative hard enough, it will push through and become a positive.” Violence from the other side can win the public to your side because the public sympathizes with the underdog.

          RULE 12: “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.” Cut off the support network and isolate the target from sympathy. Go after people and not institutions; people hurt faster than institutions.

          http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rules_for_Radicals

        4. Obama’s “plan” (class warfare) to tax “the rich” raises $4.67 billion per year (before you subtract the negative impact on the economy of job creators not creating as many, or any, jobs, or even deciding to leave the U.S. altogether – see my post below about what’s happened in the UK).

          Again: Obama’s “plan” (class warfare)to tax “the rich” raises $4.67 billion per year.

          The U.S. debt is currently $16.164 trillion. What part of basic math do you not understand?

          The numbers don’t lie. You lie. To yourself and to everyone who wades into your mindless drivel.

        5. The Bush Tax Cuts were never meant to be permanent. That’s why Bush put an expiry date on them. The USA can’t afford them now. The current Administration and Congress need to start rolling them back, and where better to start than with the people that already have more than enough?

          Next year they’ll roll it back on another income bracket, then another the year after, but it has to start somewhere.

        6. Again:

          Two-thirds of millionaires left Britain to avoid 50 percent tax rate

          Far from raising funds, it actually cost the UK £7 billion in lost tax revenue.

          http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/9707029/Two-thirds-of-millionaires-left-Britain-to-avoid-50p-tax-rate.html

          Now, watch what happens in the U.S.A. What’s your solution, genius, barring us from leaving the country?

          Screw you. I built this. It’s my money. I pay more than enough for U.S. Gov’t waste and fraud and stupidity already. I take care of myself and my family – and community (unlike most Liberals, I give a good portion of my annual income to charity).

          You Libs can have fun trying to build your silly statist utopia without the producers who fund it all. We’ll see how long it lasts. A car without gas goes nowhere.

        7. When the countries debt becomes too great {especially due to wars} we need to raise more revenue. Thats how we have always done it. Reagan raised taxes in an attempt to curb the rising debt. In fact out of the last 80 years taxes have only been lower than right now for 5 of them. Was Eisenhower a socialist? How about Kennedy or Nixon? All presided over much higher tax rates. If you think a 39% top tax rate is too high then get the F out…..i dare you!

        8. As a UK resident who fell into that 50% tax bracket I stayed and paid the extra tax. Money isn’t a possession in itself, it’s just numbers on a sodding computer when you get down to it.

          Loving money to the extent of hoarding it for the sake of hoarding it is a sign of mental illness as far as I’m concerned.

          Well done for charitable giving BTW. It’s great you can do something nice for your community. However, don’t go believing only right-wingers like yourself do that. It’s simply not true.

        9. 3. An amount equal to ONE-HALF the GDP is held untaxed overseas by rich Americans.

          The Tax Justice Network estimated that between $21 and $32 trillion is hidden offshore, untaxed. With Americans making up 40% of the world’s Ultra High Net Worth Individuals, that’s $8 to $12 trillion in U.S. money stashed in far-off hiding places.

          Based on a historical stock market return of 6%, up to $750 billion of income is lost to the U.S. every year, resulting in a tax loss of about $260 billion.

          4. Corporations stopped paying HALF OF THEIR TAXES after the recession.

          After paying an average of 22.5% from 1987 to 2008, corporations have paid an annual rate of 10% since. This represents a sudden $250 billion annual loss in taxes.

          U.S. corporations have shown a pattern of tax reluctance for more than 50 years, despite building their businesses with American research and infrastructure. They’ve passed the responsibility on to their workers. For every dollar of workers’ payroll tax paid in the 1950s, corporations paid three dollars. Now it’s 22 cents.

          5. Just TEN Americans made a total of FIFTY BILLION DOLLARS in one year.

          That’s enough to pay the salaries of over a million nurses or teachers or emergency responders.

          That’s enough, according to 2008 estimates by the Food and Agriculture Organization and the UN’s World Food Program, to feed the 870 million people in the world who are lacking sufficient food.

          For the free-market advocates who say “they’ve earned it”: Point #1 above makes it clear how the wealthy make their money.

          6. Tax deductions for the rich could pay off 100 PERCENT of the deficit.

          Another stat that required a double-check. Based on research by the Tax Policy Center, tax deferrals and deductions and other forms of tax expenditures (tax subsidies from special deductions, exemptions, exclusions, credits, capital gains, and loopholes), which largely benefit the rich, are worth about 7.4% of the GDP, or about $1.1 trillion.

          Other sources have estimated that about two-thirds of the annual $850 billion in tax expenditures goes to the top quintile of taxpayers.

          http://truth-out.org/buzzflash/commentary/item/17649-ten-numbers-the-rich-would-like-fudged

        10. And just how do you think you’re going to get your hands on any of that to fund your kickbacks to supporters? Oh, so sorry – “programs?” (Shovel-ready, I’m sure.)

        11. I stopped reading at “Obamaphone.” Using that as an example shows you know absolutely nothing and are easily swayed by misinformation. You bitch about people doing research, but had you actually done any, you would know the “Obamaphone” claim is complete BS.

        12. That’s actually misinformation. The number of people declaring an income of £1m or greater fell by two-thirds. Instead they took advantage of loopholes in UK tax laws to avoid paying the 50% rate, many using quite dodgy schemes. HMRC (UK equivalent of IRS) are now chasing those same people for the money they ought to have paid.

        13. Oh I get it, spreading misinformation about the Obamaphone somehow means you are talking about stuff in the UK. I see… or rather what I see is an ignorant armchair mouth piece cutting and pasting any thing he can find to support his shallow arguments. If you are such an expert, why aren’t you running for office and trying to make a difference? Or is it just easier to sit and post gaudy misinformed statements on Apple forums to show us all how awesome and “in the know” you are?

          Yeah I think we know the answer.

        14. Hey 2014 (or whatever year you’re calling yourself, now)

          Get over it !!

          Your side lost !

          And if you keep on advocating things like putting laws inside a woman’s body .. voter suppression..and splitting the country into “us” & “them” .. you’re gonna become even MORE irrelevant than you already are !
          (if that’s even possible !)

    1. I think people who take this position, Macinfo, are ignoring history. In 1993-4, the Congress and President Clinton enacted both spending reforms and tax hikes. Just a few years later, the United State had its first truly balanced budget (and a year later, a meaningful surplus) in a generation. So, in fact, it can be done.

      Unfortunately, the Bush tax cuts and multiple wars put on the country’s credit card totally wrecked this progress and put us back on the road to where we are today.

      1. Let me also note, for all those have bought the nonsense that tax cuts = more jobs, that there is absolutely no evidence that it is true. In fact, two of the most staggering periods of job GROWTH took place in the 1950-60s, and in the 1990s – both time periods when the marginal tax rates were significantly higher than they are now. And the tax hike in 1993 was followed by the longest period of economic expansion in American history.

        But, I don’t suppose any of these facts are ever reported on Fox “news”…

        1. If you had bothered to check the claims, you would have discovered that the Telegraph story is utterly bogus.
          “So there was actually an increase in income in 2010-11 for those earning over £150,000 but for a massive and one off exercise in tax avoidance. And there was no impact at all of people leaving the country.”

        2. It’s laughable after you were on here babbling about how Obama was going to get his @$$ kicked by Romney that you have now come back with the dates in your name changed. You’re no multi millionaire you’re a right wing hack.

      2. Thats right. The Republicans were handed a surplus and a country that was on the path to eliminating the national debt altogether. Their first reaction was to reverse that trend because they need the huge national debt in order to justify their agenda of eliminating “big government” and getting rid of the social safety nets.

  2. Here’s my solution that Republican’s should follow-

    Vote ‘Present’ on every bill that comes before them.
    Let the Democrats have EVERYTHING they want, while simply pointing out how it is wrong, but then give it to them.

    Raise taxes
    Cut military spending to the bone
    Raise entitlements
    Pay off every constituent group you can buy.
    Allow everything EXCEPT Supreme Court nominations.
    Take complete control of health care
    Give unions a free reign
    Cut oil production and require coal caps, electric cars and solar heat

    There will then be two choices after the ensuing meltdown and DEPRESSION:

    People will see that Socialism does not work better than Capitalism

    OR

    No meltdown and thus Conservatism doesn’t work and should be forgotten.

    Of course, there is always the chance that what few moderate Democrats remain will steer things away from the left, since half the battle in Washington is simply to win, results be damned.
    But I doubt Mr. Soros will allow that…..

    1. That dried up old commie Soros is 82 years old and not looking too hot. He’ll be lucky to live long enough to see the GOP take the U.S. Senate in two years, much less watch the GOP take back the U.S. Presidency in 2016.

      1. Which, when your energy and transport infrastructures are proven to be completely inadequate for current or future needs, is utterly criminal. Cut back on the military and increase investment where it’s needed. On the USA itself.

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