Video

The U.S. markets soar in response to new earnings reports and in anticipation of a Federal Reserve rate cut. Meantime, the U.S. Treasury Secretary says the U.S. is in a "down-cline". Stocks jumped on Tuesday (March 18) as stronger-than-expected earnings from Goldman Sachs Group Inc's and Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc provided some reassurance about the ailing financial sector. All three major indexes were up close to 2 percent. Investors also looked forward to what is expected to be a steep interest rate cut from the Federal Reserve's policy-setting committee around 14:15 (EST). Fed policy-makers are expected to slash interest rates by a whopping 1 percent to try to give the flagging U.S. economy a lift. Hugh Johnson, the chief investment officer at Johnson Illington Advisors says it will take more than one good day to calm investor anxiety. He says, "One day doesn't really make a market. We are going to need many more days or even weeks before confidence in the financial markets, the stock market in particular is restored. But I would say if you are talking about my suspicions, my suspicion is we very well have passed the worst moment and the reason I say that is because pessimism is fairly widespread, it's very, very widespread, and arguably the stock market is undervalued, and you rarely get that combination of being undervalued with widespread pessimism, and when you do see it, it historically presented a buying opportunity to investors." Investors are also absorbing ...