Today was marked with news from the financial sector worried still about liquidity and solvency though low stock prices are starting the acquisition cycle.  Oil was nowhere to be found in the news as it reached daily “lows” of $123 a barrel, if you can call that a bottom at all.

The banking industry did startle investors a bit, but still not to the point of  a major sell off.  Lehmann Brothers, a banking firm that was on the brink of collapse due to subprime mortgage debt has sought and received plenty of financial backing in the form of new credit and another dilution of preferred stock shares which were sold for an $8 Billion infusion of cash, $6 Billion this quarter and $2 Billion to follow next quarter.  Some remarks were made on the topic of its ability to withstand today’s credit market, but many have stuck to the idea that the firm is solvent enough to continue and will be able to withstand any future troubles.  The street wasn’t particularly happy with its attempts to find new money, but the bankers had to do what they had to do.

The acquisition buzz should have been enough to garner any investor’s attention.  Smucker’s will buy out Folgers coffee in an all stock deal while Verizon is taking on ATT with its offer to buy the fifth-largest cell phone carrier AllTel for a whopping $27 billion.  The last few weeks have been filled with enough acquisition news for a year, these large mergers are very promising.

Generally when a currency is as cheap as the US dollar is today, foreign investment comes from far and wide to buy up US corporations.  While this remains to be seen today, companies with operations on other shores are taking to buying their domestic counterparts with capital gains in currencies.  Wall Street should welcome any future buyouts and acquisitions to boost the stock market.

For as long as oil stops making headlines, the market should rally.  Selloffs in the stock market occur each time oil tops a new number, $120 oil for the most part represents some rational buying but a lot of bubble.  If the price of oil were again to drop below $100, the stock market would rise another 1000 points without much concern.  High commodity prices are the only thing holding down prices right now.