This past Saturday night we attended a holiday party at my brother’s house. His street is very tight-knit, and they have a Christmas Party round-robin that starts at 5:30-6:30 at one neighbor’s house for cocktails, and then moves to another neighbor’s home for hors d’oeuvres, and finally ends up at my brother’s home  for the main party beginning at about 8:00 pm.

It is always a great evening (well, except for two years ago when one of the neighbors was offended that my brother and his wife called it a “holiday party” instead of a “Christmas party”, and then went on a drunken anti-politically-correct rant, offending my sister-in-law, another Jewish person, and a conflicted Atheist, but that’s not important here). This year’s festivities were no exception. The wine flowed freely (and not that crappy Market Structure Whine we sent out to our clients), and the feelings were all about the love. As a matter of fact, a group of women actually at one point started cheering and chanting my name, when I walked into the room (this is true. sigh. it happens to me all the time). Yes, I was carrying a case of wine.

Before you know it, it was 11:30pm, and my brother and his wife just wanted everyone gone. And “everyone” wasn’t leaving. This is when my Aviva, my sister-in-law, turned to me, said “watch this…” and proceeded to let her three freak rescue dogs out from the basement. They tore through the entire first floor, jumping on folks, looking for petting. One of the dogs, a black lab rescue named Maria, has this weird behavior issue where she sticks her nose in everyone’s butt. It gives me the willies. Anyways, five minutes later and you could hear Clint Eastwood whistle all spaghetti-western style. Mission Accomplished!

Why am I bringing this up? Well it occurred to me that all the SEC really needs to fix our market structure is Aviva’s dogs. Especially Maria. When the high freaks and their lobbyists get out of hand, she could just open the door to the fourth floor conference room, and let ‘em loose. Just think of all the visiting asses those dogs could poke!

Where we left off 4:00pm EST:

INDU               11,428.56                                +18.24

SPX                 1,240.46                                  +0.06

CCMP              2,624.91                                  -12.63

Futures now at 7:30am EST:

DJA                                                     +13

SPA                                                     +2.0

NDA                                                    +3.25

Key Data out today:

07:30:                                           NFIB Small Business Optimism

08:30:                                           Advance Retail Sales

08:30:                                           Advance Retail Sales less Autos

08:30:                                           PPI (expected 0.6% rise month over month)

08:30:                                           PPI Ex Food and Energy (expected 0.2% rise month over month)

08:30:                                           PPI (expected 3.3% year over year)

08:30:                                           PPI Ex Food and Energy (expected 1.2% rise year over year)

10:00:                                           Business Inventories in October (1% rise)

14:15:                                           FOMC Rate Decision (expected 0.25%… with statements that say that if you didn’t listen to David Tepper you are thick as a brick.

Since the prior close, some key stories:

–       Trichet seeks a bigger bailout fund. You know… just in case…

–       Bernanke Stimulus Options Limited as Fed Faces Republican Scrutiny  (Bloomberg)

–       Retail Sales likely have risen, as consumer spending heated up for the holidays.

–       Berlusconi Wins Confidence Vote in Italian Senate, throws party with models.

–       German Economic Sentiment 4.3 vs expected 3.9.

–       Chinese IPO Frenzy raises Talk of Bubble (NYT article)

–       China will increase export taxes on some rare earth products next year.

–       Allied Irish Bank falls 4% after the Irish Government moved to block bonus payments.

–       Yahoo to announce layoffs today.

–       HCP to buy HCR Manorcare for $6.1 billion.

Earnings:

Pre-market: BBY

After the Close: none

Significant Movers This Morning:

GXDX +16.7%, AMGN +8.2% (XGEVA phase III results) BAX +1% (buyback) INHX -15.2% (FV-100 phase II results) LCI -9.8% (secondary) ICO -6.3% (secondary) LNDC -5.9% (guidance) HMIN -5.1% convert deal) YMI -5% (secondary) MPG -3.1% (mortgage default) DX -2.8% (secondary).