The Market And Energy Page, T+325 -- December 12, 2017 -- This Market Is Unstoppable

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Market: this market is simply unstoppable. The Dow and S&P 500 each hit a new record yesterday. I keep looking for a pullback. Last night, Dow futures were up 30 points. I had not looked at the market until a few minutes ago and now I see that the Dow is up 135 points and I can't explain it. The market just hit another milestone -- it just hit a new, all-time intra-day high (24,538). I quickly turned on CNBC, to a reader I wrote:

Santelli was just talking about bonds, and telling us that one of the curves will invert tomorrow when the Fed raises rates. [The 10-year is now 2.415%.]

Then the anchor says the "market is having a pretty good day." Wow, what an understatement ... these guys simply can't excited about the Trump rally.

I have no idea why the market jumped 130 points today; perhaps investors are happy to see a bit of wholesale price inflation ... finally.

US economy. The WSJ on jobs last week -- December 8, 2017 -- 607 comments to date. The lede:

The U.S. economy is hitting milestones not seen in more than a decade, marked by robust hiring that has led to low unemployment and a sustained pickup in output.

Labor Department data Friday showed nonfarm payrolls rose a seasonally adjusted 228,000 in November—the record 86th straight month of expansion—after a 244,000 gain in October. Steady hiring has in turn driven the unemployment rate down to 4.1% for two straight months, holding at a 17-year low.

That would put economic output on track for a third straight quarter of near 3% growth, a breakout, for now at least, from a long period of 2% growth. The economy hasn’t delivered three straight quarters of growth at or above 3% since a period from mid-2004 to early 2005.

GDP Now. I don't know if I posted this earlier, but the latest forecast has dropped below 3%:

The GDPNow model forecast for real GDP growth (seasonally adjusted annual rate) in the fourth quarter of 2017 is 2.9 percent on December 8, down from 3.2 percent on December 5.

The forecasts of real consumer spending growth and real private fixed-investment growth declined from 2.8 percent and 8.1 percent, respectively, to 2.5 percent and 7.0 percent, respectively, after this morning's employment report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The model's estimate of the dynamic factor for November—normalized to have mean 0 and standard deviation 1 and used to forecast the yet-to-be released monthly GDP source data—declined from 1.13 to 0.47 after the report.

Surge: in the ten minutes it has taken me to write this much, the Dow has jumped from 135 points to 167 points. I have some hunches but won't say anything. I don't want to remove all doubt about my  insanity.

Brent crude oil prices soar -- TheStreet. Highest price since mid-2015, ... 

... topping $65 a barrel as J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. analysts increased their price forecasts for next year and identified some spread trades for investors might consider in the oil market. 

Prices for the global benchmark Brent crude oil for February 2018 delivery were up more than 1% to $65.45 at around 8:30 a.m. EST. Future contracts for West Texas Intermediate crude for January delivery rose about 0.8% to settle at $58.45 on Tuesday.