The first trading session of 2013 is in the books as markets turned in one of the best performances in recent memory. After weeks of tireless debates, Congress was able to come to an agreement to avert the fiscal cliff, extending some of the Bush-era tax cuts among other things. The bill, crafted by Vice President Joe Biden and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell helped avoid a crisis, but still left some of the issues on the table, as Congress will be forced to come to a conclusion on the U.S. debt ceiling come February [Download Seven Simple & Cheap ETF Model Portfolios].
Global Market Overview: Stocks Surge On Fiscal Cliff Deal
Markets took cues from the positive movement from Washington and were off to the races today. The tech-heavy Nasdaq ETF (QQQ, A-) led the way with gains just shy of 3.2%. The S&P 500 Fund (SPY, A) and Dow Jones ETF (DIA, B) were not far behind with gains of 2.56% and 2.44% respectively.
International markets also spiked on the news of the fiscal cliff solution with the SPDR S&P China ETF (GXC, A) turning in gains of 3.08% for the first session of the year.
Bond ETF Roundup
The fixed income space was a mixed bag as junk bonds and investment grade corporates were able to scrape up gains while the remainder of the space took a fall for the day.
Commodity ETF Roundup
Natural gas was one of the most talked about commodities of the day as a warm forecast sent the commodity into the gutter. Oil was a big winner of the fiscal cliff resolution and gold was able to ride the coat tails of the equity space as a whole. Ags had a tougher time to start the year as both corn and soybeans took a hit.
ETF Chart Of The Day#1: (SPY)
The S&P 500 cracked the 1,450 mark today and has its eyes set in its next resistance level that falls somewhere around 1,474. SPY gapped higher at the opening and only found more momentum in the closing hours as the king of ETFs jumped nearly 2.6% on the day.
ETF Chart Of The Day #2: (VXX)
Though the VIX ETN normally trades around 27 million shares on a daily basis, today saw VXX move more than 36 million shares as this fund surrendered more than 11.8% to start off the year. Though VXX got slammed today, should markets suffer a correction tomorrow, VXX could regain some lost ground [see our Low Volatility Portfolio].
ETF Fun Fact Of The Day
The best-performing Themed ETFdb Portfolio of the past 13 weeks has been the Risk On ETFdb Portfolio which has gained just under 6%.
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Disclosure: No positions at time of writing.
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