The Dow Jones Industrial Average managed to maintain its delicate forward momentum to close at 10,450.64 today, an increase of 16.47 points. This combined with $7.65 billion in sales of HSBC, JPMorgan Chase, and Bank of America bonds have shown an increase in overall investor confidence.
HSBC’s bond sales were especially surprising since it’s the largest bank in Europe. This indicates that investors also feel very confident about their ability to fulfill the debt obligation even amongst the acknowledgement of severe economic problems in Europe—and in light of the fact that European and Asian markets were mixed on Friday with UK’s FTSE 100, Japan’s Nekkei 225 and Germany’s DAX all closing down. Interestingly, fears about Spain’s economy also seem to be subsiding as Spanish financial institutions announced their willingness to be a part of European bank resiliency tests.
Even though BP Plc (NYSE: BP) is searching for loans of as much as $7 billion, the stock still holds some appeal to investors. It closed up today, though not by much. The Nasdaq and the S&P 500 continued also had up days with the Nasdaq closing at 2,309.80—an increase of 2.64 points—and the S&P closing up 1.47 points at 1,117.51.
