Economy/Stock Market: Shutdown - Who Needs A Government Anyway?

(Drivebycuriosity) - The media are obsessed with the shutdown of the U.S. government. The U.S. president declared that "Wall Street should be worried" (cnbc). But the stock market ignored the unreasonable scaremongers and did not panic. Today the S&P 500, a gauge for the U.S. stock market, gave just 1% up and is still close to its all-time high.

There is no reason for panic. Since spring 2009 the global economy has been rising and stock markets have been rallying, weathering though a lot of nuisances like U.S. debt ceiling scares, austerity policy, downgrades of U.S. rating and more. Soon the current shutdown will also be forgotten.

The data from the economic front show that the global upswing is continuing. This morning we learned that the U.S. service sector continued its solid growth in September and services in China and Europe accelerated. We also got news that the U.S. weekly jobless claims are at the lowest level since May 2007 (before the recession started). 

I reckon that the current weakness of the stock market will be as short lived as the setbacks since spring 2009 and believe that the S&P 500 will end this year significantly higher than today.