Stocks Shrug off Government Shutdown, boosted by Apple

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By Hibah Yousuf @CNNMoneyInvest October 1, 2013: 4:26 PM ET

Late this past Monday night, Congress failed to pass a budget and triggered a government shutdown for the first time in nearly two decades Tuesday. But Wall Street took Washington's act and swept it under the rug.  In the days leading up to the shutdown, the market had sold off with many investors cashing out to save what they could.  The Dow and S&P 500 declined for seven of the last eight trading days, including the Dow's triple-digit loss on Monday.  According to Joe Rundle, Head of trading at ETX, many investors are expecting the shutdown to be resolved quickly, risking little damage to the overall economy. 

Plus, the market is far more concerned about the looming debt limit deadline. If the government hits its debt ceiling in mid-October, it will not be able to pay all of its bills.

Waking up Tuesday morning has been a surprise to many as well as the markets opened up in the green, and continued to rise throughout the day, not dropping off the edge as others feared.

Activist investor Carl Icahn has given Apple shares quite a lift these last few weeks.
Shares of Apple (AAPL, Fortune 500) rallied after Icahn tweeted that he met with Apple CEO Tim Cook Monday and "pushed hard" for a $150 billion stock buyback. Icahn added that the two plan to continue the conversation in three weeks, which will be around the time Apple releases its fiscal fourth-quarter earnings. The activist investor also revealed that he now owns a nearly $2 billion stake in Apple.

My personal opinion on both these articles is positive for now, but I expect to turn negative in the near future as these are only temporary floaters for the stock markets in America as a whole and as Apple stock especially.  I believe that the stocks will shave their gains made from today, or maybe over this next week once our government and people start to get desperate over what the plan is.

When I was combing through the news late Monday night, waiting for the verdict on our future economy basically, I was extremely fearful once news broke out bringing many services to a grinding halt.  I fear next to the worse for my personal investments and immediately started drafting plans for unloading shares in multiple companies I believed to be in danger of a shutdown.  I understand the shutdown process well, and am very disappointed and irritated but mostly flummoxed on how the Senate and House cannot compromise on what seems to be everything, and are acting in "either" and "or" ways.  Although I'm not pleased with our governments performance, I believe highly that this shutdown result is a mammoth reflection of the people in America too. 

I'm worried about the next month especially with the Debt Ceiling in mid-October, which wiped much value from my investments across the board the last time we argued about what we want and don't want.