The United States Department of Commerce released a statement today discussing the results of new residential sales for single-family homes in June 2010. The statement explains that single-family home sales jumped 23.6% in June 2010. Since expectations were for a 3.7% increase this news was happily received by investors as a possible indication that economic recovery may be progressing better than was thought last week when Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said that U.S. economic conditions had created a less than supportive environment for economic growth.
In even more positive economic news, Fedex Corp (NYSE:FDX) announced today that they had upped their forecast for earnings per share for the year. The announcement, posted on their website, stated that they expected EPS to be as high as $1.05 to $1.25 per share—a potentially substantial increase from their earlier forecast of about $0.85-$1.05 per diluted share (you can read the full announcement here). Thanks to these positive developments the Dow Jones Industrial Average surged up 100.81 points to close at 10,525.43. The Nasdaq closed up 26.96 points to close at 2,296.43 and the S&P 500 closed at 1,115.01 up 12.35 points from Friday.
European and Asian markets all closed up on Monday, likely the result of Friday’s announcement that all but 6 of the 91 banks tested passed European Bank Stress Tests.
