Market Review By TraderXP: 

Oil fell for the first time in six days on concern that U.S. lawmakers will fail toavert financial crisis after the House Republican leaders canceled a vote for higher taxes for top earners.
"Oil has been bulled all week on hopes that the U.S. intends to solve the problem and now it seems that there is no quick fix," said Addison Armstrong, director of market research at Tradition Energy in Stamford, Connecticut. "We have little time, and that is on the market spooked."

Market News

Wall Street WeekAhead: a lump of coal for the "Financial Cliff Christmas"
Wall Street traders have to work to pack tablets and computers in their holiday luggage in the end.
Traditionally quiet week can become hell for traders as well as politicians in Washington will likely not meet the agreement to deal with the $ 600 billion in tax increases and spending cuts due to kick in early next year. Many economists predict that the "financial cliff" will push the economy into recession.
Fiasco on Thursday in the U.S. House of Representatives, where Speaker John Boehner failed to ensure the passage of a bill that would pressure President Obama and Senate Democrats, only added to the worry that the prolonged budget negotiations will stretch into 2013.
However, the market remains stable. Decline Friday on Wall Street caused the fiasco Boehner, was not enough to prevent the S & P 500 by placing their best week in four.
"Markets have been a kind of taking it for granted," said Sandy Lincoln, chief market strategist at BMO Asset Management U.S. inChicago, which has about $ 38 billion in assets under management.
"The market is still largely believe that something will be done," he said.
If something happens next week, it will come in time. The markets will be open for a half day on Christmas Eve, when Congress is not in session, and will close on Tuesday for Christmas. Wall Street will resume regular stock trading on Wednesday, but the volume is expected to be light throughout the week with dozens of market participants away on vacation.
For the week, the three major U.S. stock indexes plus, the index Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.4 percent, S & P 500 rose 1.2 percent, and Nasdaq Composite Index rose 1.7 percent.
The shares are also booked solid profits for the year so far, just five trading sessions left in 2012: Dow advanced by 8 percent, while the S & P 500 rose by 13.7 percent, and the Nasdaq jumped by 16 percent.
It could get a little crazy
Capital volume is expected to fall sharply in the next week. Last year, the daily volume for each of the past five trading days have fallen on average by 49 percent, compared to the rest of 2011 - to just over 4 billion shares exchanging hands on the day on the New York Stock Exchange, NYSE, Nasdaq and MKT in the last five sessions of the year with the 2011 daily average of 7.9 billion.
If this trend continues, low volumes can generate aspike volatility as traders monitor any progress in the rock talks in Washington.
"I guess it will be a low volume week. There's not much more than a financial cliff, which will continue to make headlines," said Joe Bell, senior equity analyst at Schaeffer's Investment Research in Cincinnati.
"Many people already have a foot in the door, and with the possibility of a market-moving news, you get the possibility of increased volatility."
Economic data would have to be way off the mark tomove markets next week. But if recent trends better than expected economic data has, the stock will have a strong fundamental support that couldprevent sales from getting too even as the financial negotiations rocks grinding together.
Small and mid-cap stocks outperformed their larger counterparts in the last couple of months, which indicates a shift in investor sentiment towards the U.S. economy. S & P MidCap 400 Index has overcome the technical point of view, confirming their close above 1,000 for the second week.
"We see the lead in the middle of the lid and the decay of this level, as a strong sign for the market in general," Bell said Schaeffer.
"Whenever you have a flight risk, he suggests investors are starting to have more appetite for risk."
Evidence of this shift can be a splash of shares in the defense sector, is expected to take a hit as defense spending is a key component of the budget negotiations.
PHLX Defense Sector index was record high on Thursday, and much better than the market on Friday, with the fall of just 0.26percent, while the three major U.S. stock indices ended the day down about 1 percent.
After half a day on Wall Street on Monday ahead of the Christmas holidays, Wednesday will bring S & P / Case-Shiller Home Price Index. Expected to show the ninth consecutive month benefit.
U.S. unemployment on Thursday observed roughly in line with the level of the previous week, with the forecast for 360,000 new claims for unemployment benefits, compared with the previous week to 361,000. Reuters.com

Wall Street endslower after "financial cliff" failure
U.S. stocks ended lower on Friday after a Republican plan to avoid "financial cliff" failed to get enough support on Thursday night, draining hope that an agreement will be reached before 2013.
However, stocks managed to rebound from the lows of the day near the end of the session, and within a week, the three major U.S. stock indices ended higher, while S & P 500 gaining 1.2 percent.
Trading was volatile because of waning confidence in the prospects of the transaction from Washington, and in particular as a result thequarterly expiration of options and futures contracts. CBOE Volatility Index, or VIX, a favorite barometer of the market, investors worry, finishedbelow session high.
Republican House Speaker John Boehner failed to gather enough votes, even from his own party to pass his "Plan B" tax bill late Thursday. It was the latest setback in the negotiations to avoid $ 600 billion in tax increases and spending cuts that some say it may affect the U.S. economy into recession.
"The fact that a Plan B was disappointing, if not surprising, but now there is a real lack of clarity about what will happen, and the markets hate it," said Mike Hennessy, managing director of investments for Morgan Creek in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.
Index Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 120.88 points, or 0.91 percent, to 13,190.84 at the close. 500 Index Standard & Poor fell 13.54 points, or 0.94 percent, to 1,430.15. The Nasdaq Composite Index lost 29.38 points, or 0.96 percent, to 3,021.01.
"Surprisingly, this sharp drop today can not really make a lot of technical picture - if the decline is even worse," said Larry McMillan, president of options research firm McMillan Analysis Corp, in a research note.
For the week Dow gained 0.4 percent, Nasdaq rose 1.7 percent.
On Friday, Herbalife fell for the eighth consecutive session. Investor Bill Ackman recently increased its campaign against the company. Stock skidded 19.2 percent to $ 27.27 and lost more than 35percent in the week.
Plan B, which called for increasing taxes on those earning $ 1 million or more a year, was not going to pass the Democratic-led Senate or gain recognition from the White House anyway. But it is subject to the fact that it will be difficult to get the support of the Republican broader tax increases, President Barack Obama urged.
However, the decline of about 1 percent in the three major U.S. stock indices indicate that investors do not believe the economy is excessively damaged due to the lack of a deal, said Mark Lehmann, president of JMP Securities in San Francisco.
"You could easily woke up today and saw the market down 300 or 400 points, and all would have said," This I say to you, it's really hard, "said Lehmann.
"I think that if you get in the middle of January and (negotiations) to keep going like this, you get worried, but I do not think we're going to get there."
Banking stocks, which is excellent in the boom market and led to signs of progress in resolving the financial deadlock led decline on Friday. Citigroup Inc fell 1.7 percent to $ 39.49, while Bank of America slipped 2 percent to $ 11.29. KBW Banks index lost 1.19 percent.
Volatility on Friday exacerbated in particular, the "four witches", the quarterly expiration of stock index futures and options, stock options and single stock futures contracts.
About 8.59 billion shares changed hands on the major exchanges in the U.S., more than the daily average of 6.47 billion daily in 2012, in part because "four witches" exhalation.
All-day data indicated the economy was surprisingly stable in November, consumer spending rose by most in three years, and the sensor business investment jumped.
But separate data showed consumer sentiment fell in December. S & P retail trade fell by 1.2 percent.
US-listed shares of Research in Motion sank 22.7percent to $ 10.91 after the Canadian company, known as a manufacturer of BlackBerry, announced the first ever decline in its subscriber numbers on Thursday along with a new fee structure for its high-margin service segment. Reuters.com