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CNN Live At Daybreak

Gallup Poll: Investors Think Markets Need Stimuli

Aired June 26, 2001 - 08:33   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LINDA STOUFFER, CNN ANCHOR: More now on what consumers may be thinking. With the Dow dropping like a stone, investor anger could be rising. The Gallup organization has been taking the pulse of stock investors, and Gallup Poll editor in chief Frank Newport is in Princeton, New Jersey with some economic indicators of his own.

Hey there, Frank.

FRANK NEWPORT, EDITOR IN CHIEF, GALLUP POLL: Good morning, Linda. This is PaineWebber/Gallup index of investor optimism. It just looks at those individuals who have $10,000 or more invested in the market. That's about 40 percent of the American public.

The investors are telling in this index that they need some stimulus, it looks like, from the Fed today or tomorrow if they make that decision. The index was put at 100 back in 1996. That's what represented over here. Then it up in about 1998, then it's come down and in our latest reading, is 104 over here on index back, again, back to 1996. This is down significantly even from earlier this year, as I'll show you on this next graphic.

A little earlier this spring, people that were investors were a little more optimistic, but now we're back to that 104 number. You can see even in March, investor optimism had been up. But it's just coming back down.

One issue may be energy. These are investors who were asked about the impact of the energy situation on the economy. You can see, 57 percent said it has a major impact. When we look at the internal analysis, the people who are most worried about energy that are investors are also most negative about the market.

Finally, one other point here, still some bullish sentiment looking ahead. We don't know how much, but when we ask people will the stock market be higher or lower next year, investors still, a little over half, are telling us they still think they'll be up. Of course, the lower the market goes, the higher the probability it will be up next year. But nevertheless, that's what we're see. All in all, investors are telling us they would like to be little more optimistic.

Linda, back to you.

STOUFFER: Frank, thanks a lot. TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com