Happy Thursday to You

Some analysts claimed that the market's performance for the first week of the year predicted how the rest of the month would go. This month might throw those statistics off. Today, the blue chips closed at a new all-time high, with the Dow ending at 12514.98. Tech stocks led the climb, with Microsoft up 3.5%. Their shares were up higher than they've been in four years. Also helping today's happy ending were low oil prices. Traders finally had a dramatic reaction to the drop in crude oil prices. Not enough to make you smile? Several traders took comfort in jobless claims dropping to a six-month low, indicating the economy isn't slowing too quickly. Happy Thursday to us! DJIA: +72.82 Nasdaq: +25.52 S&P 500: +8.97