What’s Happening In The Stock Market And Elsewhere

In its first unanimous decision since 2011, the Federal Reserve announced another $10 billion cut in its monthly bond purchases. It attributed the decision to the “growing underlying strength in the broader economy.” Read the statement (Citing Growth, Fed Again Cuts Monthly Bond Purchases).

As a result of the committee’s action to reduce quantitative easing to $65 million/month, stocks tumbled (FED TAPERS AND STOCKS DIVE: Here’s What You Need To Know).

In spite of the recent selloff in equities, Paul Price has been buying stocks and selling puts (SYY and IGT).

This might make you want to eat at home, skip the ice, and wash your hands after touching the menu: These Cringeworthy Restaurant Truths Will Make You Think Twice About Dinner. 

Watch chemicals turn into memories – the first time this has ever been recorded.

“All You Need for a Financial Crisis. . . are excess optimism and Citibank.”

That’s a saying that someone, probably Simon, repeated to me a few years ago. Crash of 1929, Latin American debt crisis, early 1990s real estate crash (OK, that wasn’t a financial crisis, just a crisis for Citibank), Asian financial crisis of 1997–1998, and, of course, the biggie of 2007–2009: anywhere you look, there’s Citi. Sometimes they’re just in the middle of the profit-seeking pack, but sometimes they play a leading role: for example, the Citicorp-Travelers merger was the final nail in the coffin of the Glass-Steagall Act and the immediate motivation for Gramm-Leach-Bliley.

Barry Ritholtz on Jon Stewart discussing Minimum Wage: TDS: Wage Against the Machine

The Daily Show
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This weekend: The Saddest Super Bowl Ever, according to Joshua Brown. Guess he’s not going to be there. 

For starters, it’s certainly going to be the coldest. Weather guys are talking about 2 to 7 degrees. Ticket prices are dropping by thousands of dollars. People are trying to get rid of their seats rather than sit through the pain of a sub-arctic February night outdoors. Not to mention the shlep. If it snows that day, the highways and byways between NY and NJ will become so impassable you’ll need to leave your family permanently and start a new one somewhere around Teaneck Township off of the I-80.