A drop in the number of newly laid-off workers and upbeat remarks from bellwether Cisco Systems injected confidence about an economic recovery ahead of this morning’s highly expected October jobs report, propelling the Dow average to its first close above 10,000 in two weeks. 

Cisco Systems’ (NASDAQ:CSCO) CEO John Chambers said he now sees a global economic recovery, fueling a rebound in the company’s sales this quarter.  The Dow average jumped 203 points, or 2%, while the tech-heavy NASDAQ, riding high on Cisco’s forecast, bolted up 50 points or about 2.4%. 

All ten S&P 500 industry groups ended in the green, with banking shares advancing 2.6% as analyst Dick Bove of Rochdale Securities noted the group will double by the end of 2010.  Technology shares advanced 2.2%.  Qualcomm Inc. (NASDAQ:QCOM) jumped 5.4% to $43.85 and Microchip Technology Inc. (NASDAQ:MCHP) gained 3.9% to $25.37 after it was raised to “buy"

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U.S. stocks ended mixed Wednesday after a late-session profit taking almost wiped off a 156-point rally in the Dow average that was fueled by the Fed’s encouraging assessment of the economy and its decision to keep interest rates low for an extended period.  The optimism was short-lived as investors appeared jittery ahead of the October jobs report on Friday. Fresh concerns over bank earnings resurfaced after the House of Representatives passed a bill curbing credit card rate increases.

After the house vote, financials slumped 1.5% and led the decliners among the S&P 500 industry groups.  Analyst Meredith Whitney noted the biggest U.S. banks may face declining values on home-loan bonds with government backing as the Fed moves towards ending its $1.25 trillion purchase program.  Whitney said bank earnings are far from approaching "normalcy," and will reflect regulatory changes for an extended period.  JPMorgan (NYSE:JPM) fell 1.2% to $42.21 and

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ENGLEWOOD, CO — (Marketwire) — 11/04/09 — Biomedical Technology Solutions Holdings, Inc. (”BMTS” or the “Company”; www.bmtscorp.com) (OTCBB: BMTL) is pleased to announce the introduction of the Demolizer® II System into the Geisinger Health organization for the onsite treatment of biomedical waste.

The Geisinger Health System is one of the nation’s leading fully integrated health services organizations. Founded in 1915, Geisinger is a physician-led health care system, dedicated to health care, education, research and service spanning 43 counties in Pennsylvania and serving over 2.6 million people in primarily rural communities.

The Demolizer® II is a safe and simple biomedical waste treatment system ideally suited to meet the unique needs of clinics in rural areas where the cost, both financial and environmental, of traditional transport and offsite disposal can be prohibitive. Cost savings from adoption of the Demolizer® II are expected to be significant. More importantly, the Demolizer® II

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Iran is 'unwilling to accept' a deal that would see most of its enriched uranium shipped abroad. 'Tehran is obviously probing to see whether President Obama can play hardball or whether he can be played.'  Russia will share the 'prize' that is the giant Yamal gas resource, but only because Gazprom can't handle the challenge on its own, argues Rossiyskaya Gazeta.  Ecuador's President Rafael Correa made his first visit to Russia this week to court support for a planned overhaul of his country's energy industry.  Signing a series of agreements on arms and energy (particularly hydropower), President Dmitry Medvedev heralded 'the beginning of cooperation'.  Will state-owned nuclear corporation Rosatom take the place of Germany's RWE in the Belene nuclear power plant?  Speaking at the Solar Power International Conference, being held in California this week, Robert Kennedy ...

This week initial claims for unemployment insurance rose to 531,000, an increase of 11,000 from last week. Last week's number was also revised upwards by 7,000, so the real increase is more like 18,000. The week-to-week numbers can be all over the place, so the four-week average is generally a better gauge. It fell by a slight 750 to 532,250. It is now 126,500 below its mid-April peak. Almost certainly we have seen the highs for the cycle. While the decline is very welcome, the absolute level is still extremely high, as shown by the graph below (from http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/). Even with the decline, we are still above the highest point in either of the last  two recessions. We reall need to get back down below 400,000 and stay there to indicate that the economy is adding jobs. The last two recessions had long periods where, after an ...

This post provides links to a number of interesting articles I have read over the past few days that you may also enjoy.

• Gerard Lyons (Times Online): Discovering if we learnt the lessons of Black Monday, October 19, 2009. Today (Monday) is the twenty-second anniversary of Black Monday. On this day in 1987 stock markets around the world crashed. The Dow Jones fell 22.6 per cent in one day, London shed one fifth of its value over two days. The newspapers and television were full of pictures of traders in panic. Sound familiar? Reflecting on 1987 is interesting in its own right and has lessons for today.

• Allan Dodds Frank (The Daily Beast): Hedge fund dominoes, October 18, 2009. Friday’s insider-trading charges against the founder of Galleon could be the tip of the iceberg. Other hedge funds and the McKinsey consulting

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A very caustic article by Con Coughlin in the Telegraph argues that Russia cannot be trusted as an ally, i.e. - Washington is wasting its time believing that cooperation on Iran is coming.  Not that he has any strong feelings about the subject...Now that he has won the Nobel peace prize, Mr Obama, no doubt, believes that he will prevail in his attempts to end the atmosphere of mutual antipathy that has defined relations between the US and Russia. But that requires the Russians to embrace his overtures, not exploit them.

This post provides links to a number of thought-provoking articles I have read over the past few days that you may also find of interest.

• Fred Bergsten (Foreign Affairs): The dollar and the deficits: How Washington can prevent the next crisis, November 2009. If the US is serious about recovering from the global economic crisis, it must balance the budget, stimulate private saving, and embrace a declining dollar.

• Randall Forsyth (Barron’s): Weak dollar equals strong stocks, for now, October 14, 2009. As long as there is no ready substitute for the dollar, Wall Street can celebrate the currency’s steady decline. And U.S. GDP will be boosted by a cheap greenback’s spur to exports and deterrent to imports. This cannot go on forever, however. The dollar’s fall may not have started on President Obama’s watch, but it may become his problem.

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SIRIUS XM Radio (Nasdaq: SIRI) today announced that OutQ, the nation’s first and only 24/7 radio channel dedicated to the LGBT community, will broadcast extensive coverage of the National Equality March in Washington, DC this weekend including live coverage of President Obama’s keynote address at the Human Rights Campaign National Dinner on October 10. The Equality March is an event organized to fight for equal protection for LGBT people in all matters governed by civil law in all 50 states.

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Yesterday was another exciting day on Wall Street. The Dow rose 131 points…and gold shot up $25 to a new record, $1043.

Investors must be pondering the future.

What will the future look like? No one knows. But investors thought they saw things they liked.

For one thing, there was the Federal Reserve governor from New York, who told the world that there was no risk of a rate hike anytime soon. Bill Dudley knows which way the wind is blowing. He said the Fed would hold money policy loose “indefinitely.”

Indefinitely is otherwise known as “as long as it takes.”

But as long as it takes for what? Ah…as long as it takes until the economy appears strong again.

How long will that be? Ah…maybe longer than anyone realizes.

Yesterday, we were calculating how long it would take to get the jobless number back down to ’90s levels…that is, around 5%. There are now about 131 …