Somebody slipped a Mickey Finn in the drinking fountain at the NYSE today. Seriously though, it was one of the calmest trading days in several weeks. The volume wasn’t through the roof, yet it wasn’t lacking a great deal either; just right. The futures were up strong overnight causing the major indices to gap up this morning and they closed higher today.

The GDP, the broadest measure of economic growth (contraction), came in a bit better than expected this morning as well. The market was looking for a 0.5% decline but instead got a 0.3% decline and that sat well with the markets. Add to that a flat jobless number this week and the economic picture appears to be improving. However, in this market environment anyway, that could all change with the next batch of economic data.