Qaddafi is dead!

     I don't know if you all have heard yet but Moammar Qadaffi has been captured and killed.  The Misrata Military Council led an attack on Qadaffi's hometown of Sirte where the ex-dictator was hiding.  Not all the details are out yet but it seems Qadaffi was shot in the head and the legs whilst trying to escape rebel fighters in Sirte.  More details to come later on.

     Libya is the largest oil producing country in Africa and oil prices dropped on this news.

     In other news, markets are quiet today trading in a 70 point range in the early going.  There has not been much news to catalyze the markets today although new claims for unemployment benefits dropped to 403,000 which was slightly higher than economists had forecast.  More importantly the four week moving average of new claims for unemployment benefits dropped to 403,000.  This shows that even though the economy seems troubled, employers are not laying off people like crazy.