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Thursday May 5, 1977
. . . where the 1970s live forever!

News stories from Thursday May 5, 1977


Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:

  • Advancing at a double-digit annual rate in April, wholesale prices rose for the third consecutive month. The Labor Department reported an increase of 1.1 percent. This matched the gain in March and followed a rise of 0.9 percent in February. Both wholesale and consumer prices have been rising this year at a rate of more than 10 percent. Sharp increases in processed food costs and fuel prices helped bring the Wholesale Price Index up last month. A Commerce Department economist said that the figures were "disturbing" but that some "favorable signs" were provided by the easing of price pressures on industrial materials. [New York Times]
  • Steel production costs and a possible price increase were discussed by United States Steel's chairman, Edgar Speer, and the Carter administration's top economic policy makers at the White House. The officials were said to have advocated the smallest possible price Increase now, but government analysts acknowledge that the steel industry has to make up some recent rises in manufacturing costs, [New York Times]
  • A large increase in auto loans was mainly responsible for a record increase of $2.7 billion in consumer credit in March, the Federal Reserve Board said. The former record for a one-month increase was $2,1 billion in February 1973. Consumers borrowed $18.3 billion in March, and paid off $15.5 billion in old debts, also a record. [New York Times]
  • Stocks overcame losses early in the session and generally, but modestly, advanced. Rising shares outnumbered declining ones 4 to 3. It was the seventh consecutive session in which prices rose and the longest period this year in which prices stayed up. The Dow Jones industrial average rose 2.72 points to 943.44. [New York Times]
  • President Carter flew to London where he will participate in a seven-nation economic conference with Western and Japanese leaders. He said on leaving Washington that the meeting "will be designed to put the people of the world back to work" and "discourage a rapid robbing of people by inflation." While in London, the President will also take part in a four-power discussion of Berlin and a meeting of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. He will make a side trip Monday to discuss the Middle East situation with President Hafez al-Assad of Syria. He will return to Washington Tuesday night. [New York Times]
  • Former President Richard Nixon's interview by David Frost Wednesday night was apparently the most-watched news interview in the history of television and one of the highest-rated news broadcasts ever, according to early ratings from four cities.

    Nearly three years after leaving the presidency, Nixon remains an exile, a divisive figure who stirs strong emotions in many Americans, judging by the reaction to the Nixon interview. [New York Times]

  • San Franciscans are learning to live with mandatory cutbacks in water consumption brought on by California's two-year drought. Water use has been reduced "a shade over 25 percent." a city official said. The conservation effort has had wide support among San Franciscans and just about everyone agrees that it is the little things that count most in cutting down on the use of water. [New York Times]
  • A renewed pledge was made by the State Department that the United States would not offer any aid to Vietnam, apparently influenced by an overwhelming House vote Wednesday night against even the discussion of American assistance to Hanoi. The House vote of 266 to 131 was interpreted widely in Washington as a clear sign that Congress remains strongly opposed to any economic aid for Vietnam's Communist government, despite the talks just completed in Paris on normalizing relations between Hanoi and Washington. [New York Times]
  • India is getting back the democratic institutions that were dismantled by Indira Gandhi's government. By legislation and official declaration, the new government of Prime Minister Morarji Desai has moved to restore the independence of the press, the judiciary and the civil service. [New York Times]


Stock Market Report

Dow Jones Industrial Average: 943.44 (+2.72, +0.29%)
S&P Composite: 100.11 (+0.15, +0.15%)
Arms Index: 0.73

IssuesVolume*
Advances82512.81
Declines6106.89
Unchanged4793.75
Total Volume23.45
* in millions of shares

Arms Index is the ratio of volume per declining issue to volume per advancing issue; a figure below 1.0 is bullish.

Market Index Trends
DateDJIAS&PVolume*
May 4, 1977940.7299.9623.33
May 3, 1977934.1999.4321.95
May 2, 1977931.2298.9317.97
April 29, 1977926.9098.4418.33
April 28, 1977927.3298.2018.37
April 27, 1977923.7697.9620.59
April 26, 1977915.6297.1120.04
April 25, 1977914.6097.3320.44
April 22, 1977927.0798.4420.70
April 21, 1977935.8099.7522.74


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