Market Action

• Talk of M&A activity early in the week elevated markets as GE’s attempt to acquire Alstom and Pfizer’s bid for AstraZeneca dominated headlines. Stronger than expected data on Pending Home Sales also worked to move markets up
• Major economic data turned in mixed reviews during the week. GDP crawled to 0.1% in Q1 far below analyst estimates. However stronger than expected Nonfarm Payroll data, along with revisions to January and February, show more than 200,000 jobs were created each month in Q1. The unemployment rate stands at 6.3% but labor force participation continues to fall
• Markets had muted reaction to the data as the Dow closed at an all time high on Wednesday despite poor GDP numbers yet closed down on Friday even with positive jobs news
• The Federal Reserve continued with its taper of monthly purchases, lowering them to $45B as the market expected
• Energy assets demonstrated little movement during the week as data releases provided little coherent direction
• Analysts continue to struggle parsing economic data releases for just how much an influence a record winter had on any negative reports. Bad weather has been a faulty factor in
• Yields on long term US bonds continued to sink during the week reaching their lowest levels in over 10 months
• Gold continued a downward trend for the second week in a row

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