News

Te big Middle East news is that Syria has loaded arial bombs with Sarin gas to potentially use against their own people-opposition forces. While a big storm was in the area, the US Eisenhower Aircraft Carrier Group and the Big Deck Assault ship, Iwo-Jima both pulled up right off syrian shores, so keep an eye out for movement on that front as Sarin only has a 60-day shelf life once mixed.

The ECB's Draghi is in a press conference now, the key take aways which are really nothing new...

• *DRAGHI SAYS ECB CUT GROWTH FORECASTS, SEES `DOWNSIDE RISKS'
• *DRAGHI SEES WEAK GROWTH EXTENDING INTO 2013 BEFORE RECOVERY
• *DRAGHI SAYS GOVTS MUST REDUCE FISCAL STRUCURAL IMBALANCES
• *DRAGHI SAYS FISCAL POSITION IN U.S. MAY DAMP CONFIDENCE LONGER

US Initial Claims came in at a beat at 370k on consensus of 380k w/ the prior week AS USUAL, revised higher to 395k making the beat look even bigger, but next week this week will be revised higher as is ALWAYS the case.

Continuing Claims jumped almost 500k in a week to 3,301,200 which tells us the headline number has probably been massaged as we once again enter the Seasonal Adjustment period that was so meaningless and completely off last year, but makes for good political theater.

We don't have much more in the way of Macro data today except the EIA Natural Gas report at 10:30 a.m. and after the bell, the F_E_D Balance Sheet and Money Supply.