While Felix Baumgartner jumped from a capsule 128,000 feet in the air

While Felix Baumgartner jumped from a capsule 128,000 feet in the air and while he may have hurtled to the earth at greater than the speed of sound, his record breaking journey seems less perilous than The United States’ impending “Wile E. Coyote” fall off the fiscal cliff scheduled for 2013. However, those concerns appear second to the global growth concerns that continue to weigh on investor sentiment at the moment. Economic data out of China in the overnight session showed inflation of 1.9% in September while trade surplus numbers were better than expected. The somewhat positive news will likely be brushed off as the more important measure of China’s status, third-quarter GDP, will be reported later this week. Not much seems to have changed across the pond in Europe. Spain continues to delay what many seem to feel is the inevitable (a bailout) and Greece looks for more money. U.S. retail sales data was up 1.1% for the month of September on the back of >$4/gallon gasoline. The Empire States manufacturing index remains in negative territory but improved to -6.2 from -10.4. The precious metals complex continues its downtrend from last week with all the metals in the red this morning. Gold is trading at $1745, down .8% while silver is down nearly 1.5% to $33.15. Platinum is trading at $1640, down more than 1% while palladium is down slightly to $636.25. Have a great day!