Last december. And it wasnt just equities tt saw strength. Oil logged a 9 gain during the past five trading sessions. Today the Dow Jones Industrial average rose 33 points to close at 17,084. The nasdaq added 19, and the s p 500 added a point. Not much, but it still counts as a win. And look at the numbers for the week. The dow and s p 500 both with gains of more than 3 . Mary thompson with more now on the big week for stocks. Reporter well, Oil Activists and expectations for Central Banks will keep from raising Interest Rates this year all helped to fuel strong gains on wall street this week. Notes from the Federal Reserves last meeting suggests policy makers remain dovish, concerned about the International Markets and the lack of u. S. Inflation. All of this spurring a move into riskier assets like stocks as well as commodities. Leading the commodities space, oil. It was up almost 9 this week as it traded above but failed to close above that 50 a barrel mark. The rally spurring big gains in energy stocks, though. The weeks best performing sector. Activist investor nelson peltz taking a 2. 5 billion stake in general electric, the dows second best performing stock. And du pont, another peltz target, rising 14 after ceo Ellen Pullman said shes retiring next week. And speaking of next week, big bank earnings. Earnings for general electric, inflation data, numbers on retail sales as well as Industrial Production all in focus. From the new york stock exchange, im mary thompson. More now on oil, which did rally this week. But today failed to settle above 50 a barrel. Domestic crude prices finished at 49. 63, a gain of 20 cents. Jackie deangelis tells us why its more than just supply and demand thats driving prices higher. Reporter crude oil prices higher. Finishing the week with a little less than 10 gain. The catalyst . Tensions in the middle east. Concerns over russias involvement in syria and what it means for the region. Is russia aligning itself with iran . And could saudi arabia plan a counterattack . If that happens, could the saudis and the russians really sit down to discuss oil prices . Thats the only thing going for this market. Thats certainly a big worry. Its a big concern ofmine. And theres a lot of room for error. And those errant missiles yesterday just highlight how scary this is. But the oil market does a good job after a while of digesting these sorts of situations and i think thats going to happen again as we get used to these misfires and other actions by the russians in syria that will allow the fundamentals again just to simply overwhelm things. Reporter and the fundamental story hasnt changed. U. S. Production is off its 9. 6 million barrel per day july peak but declines are slow. Now slightly more than 9 Million Barrels per day. Investors wondering when will these numbers finally fall in a meaningful way . Also seasonality. This is the time of year that crude prices usually decline. Youre going to see huge increases in u. S. Crude Oil Inventories over the next few weeks because of this low refinery operating rate. Thats really i think going to catch some of the people by surprise and see what we did last year. Reporter the milliondollar question, where do oil prices go from here . Goldman sachs out just the other day, reiterating its bearish call, saying that oil will stay lower for longer. For nightly Business Report im jackie deangelis. So will the rally in the oil and stock markets carry through to the end of the year . Lets find out from joe duran, the ceo of united capital. Joe, welcome back. Lets start with stocks. The last two weeks have been very favorable for equities. Do you think it can continue . Oh, it can definitely continue. But i think you should expect some kind of giveback. Weve had a very strong recovery. Were now slightly overbought. And so when you have these very big whipsaws, its not unusual to go back and have a retest. Probably wont go as low as weve been but you should expect this to be a lot more volatile over the next year than weve been over the prior couple the last five or six years where its been remarkably calm. Oil, a 10 move after being depressed for so long, are we putting in a bottom here or do you expect this move to continue . No, i think i dont think its enough given the magnitude of decline. Remember, were over 100 not that long ago. So its really just noise. I do think were searching for a bottom and we fairly safely established some 42 to 48 as sort of where were at. And candidly, as long as we stay in that range, we dont go below 40, stay above 42, and the dollar kind of stays in the range, then a lot of the detractions to the market have disappeared. So its very constructive if we can just stay in a predictable range thats not a 50 decline from here like weve already experienced. I think weve found a base. It will continue to be noisy. Theres not a good reason for it to go down a lot. Theres also not a good reason for it to go up a lot. Stability, basically, is what youre saying there. Lets switch back to equities now. Earnings get really into full swing next week. A lot of the financials, some of the other big blue chips. The forecast for earnings for the Third Quarter is pretty dour. Has the market already discounted that . Yes. It definitely has. Remember, weve already marked in a third consecutive revenue decline into the market. Its priced in. I think what youre seeing now is people start if oil can continue the recovery it had well start to amend their forecast up. Whats interesting is a lot of the forecasts for earnings decline is really led by commodities, and if we get any stabilization thats going to be fantastic. And so i think youve seen the worst of it. Its really disappointing to not see more Revenue Growth as a whole. But what you would see is that a lot of this is priced in. A lot of the companies that are going to warn have warned already. Most of the noise is out of it. My biggest concern candidly is what happens in december if we get into another debate about the ceiling, the debt ceiling in the u. S. Thats really the biggest concern i have right now. We have to leave it there, joe. Thank you very much. Have a great weekend. Joe duran with united capital. Well, speaking of oil, the oil market is also watching developments in washington. The house of representatives today voted to lift the 40yearold ban on oil exports which was first put in place after the 1970s arab oil embargo. The oil industry argues that lifting the ban would create jobs. But the measure faces a much tougher fight in the senate. And sue k a petition in the house of representatives to revive the Export Import Bank drew enough signatures to force a vote on the issue. It will take place later this month. The federal agency provides loans to overseas customers of u. S. Companies like boeing and general electric. But the measure is likely to stall in the senate, where the republican Majority Leader Mitch Mcconnell is opposed to keeping the bank open. To some Economic News now. Prices for imported goods fell for the Third Straight month in september, but the decline in import prices of. 1 was smaller than expected, and that smaller decline could bolster the Federal Reserves case for raising Interest Rates. In the past fed chief janet yellen has said that import prices have been a major factor in keeping inflation well below the feds 2 target. Ty . The low rate of inflation was just one of the issues the president of the new york fed discussed today with steve liesman. In an exclusive interview bill dudley shared his take on the economy and when the central bank may decide to raise Interest Rates for the first time in nearly a decade. Is it like liu the fed could hike rates in october . I think, you know, the chair has said and i agree with her that everythings on the table. At the same time have we seen enough information between september and october to convince us to do in october what we didnt do in september would be the question i would ask. And how would you answer that . Zbliem not going to prejudge what were going to do at the october meeting. I think every meeting should be a live meeting where we go into the meeting and assess the evidence and assess how that weighs on our outlook for the economy, both with respect to the labor market and inflation, and then use that as the basis for making a decision about whether its time to lift off. Dennis lockhart said he still thinks a rate hike is likely this year. Are you in that camp as well . Based on my forecast, yes, i am. But its a forecast. And were going to get a lot of data between now and december. So its not a commitment. So if i say i think its likely this year, it doesnt mean that im committing to doing it this year. Its just based on my expectation of how the economy is most likely to evolve. Theres certainly a risk that the economy evolves in a very different way than i expect and obviously be totally inappropriate for me to not take that into consideration in terms of what i think is appropriate for monetary policy. I cant not ask this question. The poblth of a shutdown in washington and the impact there. Is that something that animates your policy making right now . I dont think so. I think first of all i would alpect cooler heads to prevail. I think its crazy to talk even think about not paying the debts that you are obligated to pay over time. Obviously, we have to take the world as it is, though, and if it involves in some crazy which which i think would be totally inappropriate, that would obviously factor into our Decision Just like any other development would factor into our sedatidecisionmaking. As for the labor market and last months disappointing jobs report dudley said it is important not to put too much weight on one report because payroll numbers can be volatile month to month. Chicagos fed president , charles evans, also spoke today. In prepared remarks he said the Federal Reserve should move modestly when it does decide to raise rates but he declined to say exactly when he would like to see that first rate hike. Tyler . And still ahead, why there was confusion today over the security of those new chip credit cards. A warning from dow jones today. The company says it found evidence that hackers have infit traited its publications including the wall street journal and barrons dating back to 2012. Information from at least 3,500 individuals may have been accessed. Officials from the company say the breach is likely part of a Broader Campaign involving other companies. And confusion today over just how secure those new chip credit and debit cards really are. First the fbi put out a warning about their vulnerabilities, only to take it down later in the day. So eamon javers has been following this story for us and he joins us now from washington. That certainly is an unusual turn of events. Yeah trk real, it really is,. This is one of those only in washington tales that really tells you how this town actually works. Let me walk you through the timeline here. Last night the fbi put out this alert saying that by the way, those chip cards, the credit cards that have just been issued to all credit card holders or most of them here in the United States or most of them as of october 1st are still vulnerable to fraud, and in that alert they urged people to use what they call chip and pin technology, that is, the chip plus a pin number that you have to enter. The National Retail federation, which represents retailers across the country whove all ewen installing new equipment to deal with these new cards, took that as a victory for their side in a longrunning fight theyve had with the banking industry. The Retail Federation said that theyd like to see a higher level of security, not just chip and signature, which is where we actually are with security on credit cards these days, but theyd like to see that whole chip and pin, and they said the fbi is endorsing their side of this argument. The bankers, though, said no, ug no, no, wait a second, the fbi might not know exactly what theyre talking about here. The bankers contacted the fbi beginning last night. And then this afternoon the fbi actually took this alert down from their website. They gave us a statement just a little while ago in which they said, we are in the process of reviewing the psa for clarity. As of this moment as i sit here right now, that psa, the alert has been removed from the fbis website. We dont know when its coming back up. We dont know what its going to say. And we dont know ultimately where the fbis going to come down in this debate between the retailers and the big banks, sue. Ah, the story continues. Something we know youll be following for us. Thank you, eamon javers in washington. Californias going to become the first state to divest from coal. The government signed into law a measure that requires state Pension Funds to drop all coal investments. And as Hampton Pearson tells us, its another blow to a sector that has already fallen on hard times. Reporter legislation signed by california govnor jerry brown gives the states two largest Pension Funds two years to divest their investments in coal companies. Environmentalists say this is an important market signal on Climate Change. This is a strong vote of no confidence in the future of fossil fuels. It puts a value on our obligation to protect future generations from the dangers of Climate Change, and it puts a price tag, if you will, on the dangerous climate pollution that driving Climate Change. An estimated 100 million is invest the in coal mines, in Pension Funds for Public Employees and teachers. Their total assets top 475 billion. The head of the California Pension Fund says it will begin negotiations with major Call Companies about their portfolio holdings. A statementldeads in part, Climate Change represents risk and opportunities for a longterm investor like calpe calpers. But pension investor experts say the future developments for state workers should not be put at risk over the debate over Climate Change. The larger issue for Pension Funds everywhere is whether politicians should be telling investors how to invest. Coal has been taking its lumps in the Commodity Markets lately, down more than 50 in the dow jones coal index just in the last six months. Meanwhile, new york and massachusetts are considering similar legislation. For nightly Business Report im Hampton Pearson in washington. United continental predicting sunny skies ahead. And thas where we begin tonights market focus. The carrier hiking its profit margin forecast for the Third Quarter. This is partially due to a new credit card agreement tore frequent flyers, which the government says will provide it month more revenue. Shares rose 6 1 2 . American airlines also rallying today. That company reporting a 70 increase in traffic last month. The biggest jump in that metric for the carrier so far this year. Shares were nearly 7 higher to 4242. Sue, Johnson Johnson has Clinical Trial of its experimental ebola vaccine in sierra leone. Theres currently no licensed vaccine or cure for this deadly disease. The dow component rose slightly today to 9537. Solar winds, a company that makes software that businesses use to manage their Data Networks say it is exploring strategic alternatives. The company could pursue a sale. Its market value about 3. 5 billion. And the stock soared more than 13 today to 47. 49. And emc saw its shares rise on continued reports of a potential deal with dell. As we told you last night, dpel could buy the company in what would be the biggest tech tieup ever. Told cnbc is reports that dell could offer at least 30 a share for emc and shares of emc up 2 1 2 today to 27. 86. Dell, as you know recall, is privately held. Now to our market monitor who likes big cap u. S. Stocks. John trainor, at peoples wealth Bank Management division which manages 5. 5 billion. When he was on in january he recommended oracle which is down about 11 . Express scripts, which is down 2 . And whole foods which has gotsen clobbered. Its down about 32 . Welcome back. Nice you have to on, john. Thank you, sir. Nice to be back. Lets start with whether you still hold those three stocks and secondly what do you make of the risk gone this week . The two you mentioned we still zone own, we like them. Whole foods we sold in the spring. We did not see the continuation of the good news me had in the fall. The Comp Store Sales decided to fall off. So we decided to step aside. We have it on a watch. We may go back in but we dont own that stock now. As it comes to the risk on weve seen that so far this month, the stocks and the sectors that didnt perform well in the Third Quarter have been the leaders so far this month. For the first few days of this month the risk on trade is working. Lets get you to walk us through some of your picks this time around. You have three big blue chips beginning with disney. Are you not concerned with something that a lot of investors have been as you se