March 24, 2009 (FinancialWire) (By Philip Holmes) -- Stocks ended higher on Monday after Treasury managed to convince investors that it was really, really serious about going ahead with a plan to fix ailing banks that looks suspiciously like the one originally pitched by the Bush administration. Hey, sometimes the right shade of lipstick can knock ten years off. The Dow Jones industrial average ended the trading session at 7,775.86, up 497.48 points. The S&P 500 index gained 54.38 points to close at 822.92, while the Nasdaq composite index lofted 98.50 points, for a 1,555.77 finish. What had investors excited was a bank rescue plan that would have the full support of the administration, or so it seems. Under the plan, up to $500 billion of toxic assets, most of it real estate-related, would be taken off the balance sheets of troubled financial institutions. Treasury would direct the use of up to $100 billion of federal money and funds from private investors in what it hopes will jump start a robust market in the trade of troubled assets, including mortgage backed securities. The assumption of the plan is that the assets aren't really that toxic, but private investors are avoiding them due to the lack of a market that would establish their true worth. And it adds a twist to the Paulson scheme, which had the government simply buy up the troubled assets at what critics were sure would be inflated prices. Geithner wants to bring the private sector in, but does so by essentially lending money to private investors, which the investors use to buy the assets. Geithner and Co. are nonetheless worried that you might see this as warmed-over Paulson, and are working to reassure taxpayers and the Street. As Jane Sasseen and Theo Francis of BusinessWeek put it, "Officials said the plan would rely on three principles: maximizing the impact of each taxpayer dollar, shared risks and profits with private-sector participants, and private sector price discovery for the "legacy" assets." Thus far, the Obama administration's efforts at saving the banks have met with mostly wariness and skepticism. One of the wariest, Paul Krugman of the NY Times, said of the latest plan, and its similarities to ideas floated by the Bush team, "This is more than disappointing. In fact, it fills me with a sense of despair." Krugman worries that the Geithner plan, ".would offer a one-way bet: if asset values go up, the investors profit, but if they go down, the investors can walk away from their debt. So this isn't really about letting markets work. It's just an indirect, disguised way to subsidize purchases of bad assets." It's hard to argue with that, given that the investors would have very little of their own money at risk.

The Investrend Earnings Calendar features Carnival Corp. (NYSE: CCL), expected at $0.19; Commercial Metals (NYSE: CMC), expected at $0.02; Deutsche Bank (NYSE: DB), expected at $1.08; Jabil Circuit (NYSE: JBL), expected at $0.13.

The Investrend Economics Calendar lists Housing Starts & Building Permits for February (8:30 a.m.), Producer Price Index (PPI) for February (8:30 a.m.), Weekly Chain Store Sales (8:55 a.m.) , Treasury auctions 2-year notes (1 p.m.).

The Investrend Events Calendar showcases POL, GPX, WWE, DMND at Sidoti & Company Emerging Growth Institutional Investor Forum; PXP, RDC, OXY, CHK at Howard Weil Energy Conference; SIGI Investor Day; SNX Shareholders Meeting.

The Investrend Money Index is an indicator of the depth of market direction or indirection. While not always including the same stocks, the NYSE/NASDAQ 50 Most Actives indicate the direction in which the mass of money is flowing. Last session's trading showed 46 advancers versus four decliners. Advancers were led by Financial Bull 3x (NYSE: FAS) up 41.29%, Bk Of America Cp (NYSE: BAC) up 26.01%, Ultra Financials Pro (NYSE: UYG) up 25.11%, Jp Morgan Chase Co (NYSE: JPM) up 24.67%, Wells Fargo & Co New (NYSE: WFC) up 23.87%, Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) up 20.70%, Citigroup Inc (NYSE: C) up 19.47%, Us Bancorp (NYSE: USB) up 19.15%, Amer Express Inc (NYSE: AXP) up 18.76%, Huntington Bancshares Incorpora (NASDAQ: HBAN) up 18.75%, Amer Intl Group Inc (NYSE: AIG) up 17.46%, E*Trade Financial Corporation (NASDAQ: ETFC) up 16.95%, Ultra S&P500 Proshrs (NYSE: SSO) up 14.29%, The Charles Schwab Corporation (NASDAQ: SCHW) up 13.49%, Alcoa Inc (NYSE: AA) up 13.15%, Hudson City Bancorp, Inc. (NASDAQ: HCBK) up 11.90%, Fifth Third Bancorp (NASDAQ: FITB) up 11.74%, News Corporation (NASDAQ: NWSA) up 11.02%, Broadcom Corporation (NASDAQ: BRCM) up 10.77%, Comcast Corporation (NASDAQ: CMCSA) up 10.69%, Ishares Tr Ftse Indx (NYSE: FXI) up 10.11%, Juniper Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ: JNPR) up 9.34%, Gen Electric Co (NYSE: GE) up 9.33%, Dryships Inc. (NASDAQ: DRYS) up 9.13%, Applied Materials, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMAT) up 8.33%, Netapp, Inc. (NASDAQ: NTAP) up 7.88%, Research In Motion Limited (NASDAQ: RIMM) up 7.73%, Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) up 7.44%, Companhia Vale Ads (NYSE: RIO) up 7.39%, Sprint Nxtel Cp (NYSE: S) up 7.25%, Nvidia Corporation (NASDAQ: NVDA) up 7.24%, Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO) up 6.73%, Oracle Corporation (NASDAQ: ORCL) up 6.73%, Exxon Mobil Cp (NYSE: XOM) up 6.72%, At&T Inc. (NYSE: T) up 6.28%. Decliners followed Financial Bear 3x (NYSE: FAZ) down 45.14%, Pt Ultrshrt Sp500 Ps (NYSE: SDS) down 14.31%.

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Investrend Website of the Day: http://www.stoptb.org/events/world_tb_day/2009/

Quote of the Day: "A nation is not in danger of financial disaster merely because it owes itself money." Andrew Mellon

Today is: American Diabetes Association Alert Day, World Tuberculosis Day.

Happy Birthday: Thomas Cushing, A. E. Becquerel, William Morris, John Wesley Powell, Andrew Mellon, Harry Houdini, Fatty Arbuckle, Thomas Dewey, Norman Fell, Steve McQueen, Tommy Hilfiger, Louie Anderson, Lara Flynn Boyle, Alyson Hannigan, Peyton Manning, Keisha Castle-Hughes.

Today in History: Robert Koch announced in 1882 the discovery of the bacterium responsible for tuberculosis (mycobacterium tuberculosis). Robert Allison of Port Carbon, Pennsylvania became the first person to buy an American-built automobile in 1898 when he bought a Winton automobile that was advertised in Scientific American. NASA spacecraft Ranger 9, equipped to convert its signals into a form suitable for showing on domestic television, broughtimages of the Moon into ordinary homes before crash-landing in 1965.

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