The Closing Look

Stocks ended higher on Tuesday, led by a big rally in a slew of energy stocks. Oil prices soared over 4% after news broke that OPEC was closer to freezing production. Gold, silver, oil and steel stocks have soared in recent weeks after pausing to digest the strong rally from the Feb low. Overnight, Italy created a $5.7B fund to buy bank stocks. Italian banks are sitting on €360 billion euros of bad loans. This is part of a new plan from Prime Minister Matteo Renzi to boost their lackluster economy. In other news, the IMF cut its 2017 global growth forecast to 3.5% from 3.6%. In the U.S., more misdirection came from the Fed. Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia President Patrick Harker said it may be prudent for Fed officials to wait for more evidence inflation before they raise rates again. Then Fed’s Kaplan Said “Fed Likely to Move in the `Not-Too-Distant Future.” This has been a common occurrence since last month’s Fed meeting.

Gary’s Thoughts: Oils breaking out. Major indices tight. Won’t take much to move them out of range to the upside as we head into earnings.