US Government Shutdown Hurts Stocks

It’s day 2 of the government shutdown. And now investors have become more nervous about the ramifications of the political stalemate in Washington.
The Dow, the S&P 500, and the Nasdaq closed Wednesday with modest losses, pulling back from steeper drops in morning trading. Stocks rallied on Tuesday, the first day of the shutdown.

The biggest worry now: the potential for a government default on October 17. If Congress fails to raise the debt ceiling, the U.S. government will be unable to pay all of its bills later this month.
Treasury Secretary Jack Lew said Tuesday that the government has started to use the last of its “extraordinary measures” to ensure it stays below debt ceiling.

via CNN

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Alfonso Esparza

Alfonso Esparza

Senior Currency Analyst at Market Pulse
Alfonso Esparza specializes in macro forex strategies for North American and major currency pairs. Upon joining OANDA in 2007, Alfonso Esparza established the MarketPulseFX blog and he has since written extensively about central banks and global economic and political trends. Alfonso has also worked as a professional currency trader focused on North America and emerging markets. He has been published by The MarketWatch, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal and The Globe and Mail, and he also appears regularly as a guest commentator on networks including Bloomberg and BNN. He holds a finance degree from the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education (ITESM) and an MBA with a specialization on financial engineering and marketing from the University of Toronto.
Alfonso Esparza