The week started sluggishly with a little positive kick at today’s closing. All three major indices closed in slightly positive territory, despite spending most of the day in the red. Volume was decent for this time of the year.

We think it is significant that the markets closed up, since two of today’s economic reports were both below expectations. The ISM manufacturing index fell below the sacrosanct 50 level, compared to last month’s 50.7, and construction spending was up from last month’s weak -0.8%.  Auto and truck sales numbers, coming in this afternoon before the market closed, were better than expected, with 15.3M vehicles versus last month’ s 15.2M and an expected 15.25M.