Markets Open Tepidly

Wall Street opened up tepidly this morning, then retreated to neutral, as the markets looked to complete a winning short-trading week and Chrysler attempted to wind up its sale to the Fiat-led consortium today.

In the first 15 minutes of trading, the Dow, the broader S&P 500 and the tech-heavy Nasdaq were essentially flat.

The markets got some good news this morning: First-quarter GDP shrank at "only" a 5.7 percent annualized rate, which is awful, but not as awful as forecasters predicted. They figured it would be a 6.1 percent contraction.

Meanwhile, in testimony in federal bankruptcy court yesterday, Chrysler chief executive Bob Nardelli said he hoped the sale of his company to the Fiat-led consortium would close today. If that's the case, the Chrysler bankruptcy has been wrapped up in the light-speed time of 29 days.

-- Frank Ahrens
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