This was set up for a good day, but ADP employment data projected about 23,000 jobs were lost rather than some 40,000 created. This lowered the unofficial expectations for Friday's unemployment data and non-farm payrolls data. Then came the weaker than expected ISM data from Chicago, which effectively sealed the fate for a weak trading day.

Bill Gross of PIMCO also noted that stock and bonds might have sub-par returns for years. With the negative macro-news flow today, a drop of 50 DJIA points after the run up we have seen lately might be considered a win.

Here were today's unofficial closing bell levels:

Dow 10,856.63 -50.79 (-0.47%)
S&P 500 1,169.43 -3.84 (-0.33%)
Nasdaq 2,397.96 -12.73 (-0.53%)

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According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, a subsection of the Commerce Department, after peaking at $321 billion in 2000 it then began a precipitous decline, dropping to $167 billion in 2001 then to $84 billion in 2002 and $64 billion in 2003. This figure has since recovered jumping to $184 billion in 2006; however, it is still meaningfully below the 2000 peak, with the upswing being very erratic from year-to-year, suggesting many countries are still hesitant to invest in the U.S.

The decline in foreign direct investment has had an impact on U.S. employment data as well. The number of Americans employed by foreign companies within the U.S. from 2000 to 2005 is down, declining from 5.7 million to 5.1 million. This is not a good number when considering the US economy has had four solid years of growth. Even with a downturn in foreign direct investment one would expect, purely from inertia, employment to have gone up.

Treasury Secretary Paulson is attempting to put the foreign direct investment tide on a sustainable uptrend, albeit doing so with a political touch. Paulson needs to soften the blow many foreigners felt following the Bush Administration's unilateral withdrawal from the Kyoto agreement, the Dubai Ports World debacle and the tough scrutiny of the Alcatel-Lucent ADS (NYSE: ALU) transaction which all left foreigners with a bad taste in their mouths.

Historically, even during good times, foreigners like to allocate a good portion of their new-found wealth into the U.S. Despite cheaper labor costs in emerging-market economies like China and India, the U.S. has a highly productive labor force, a society which produces millions of college educated students each year, a very solid currency and a flexible real estate market to construct buildings or plants in rural or urban areas. These are all attributes that can be found in few other major cosmopolitan cities.

Paulson's actions suggest the U.S. has a lot of fences that need mending. Forget the trade deficit, focus on foreign direct investment numbers to get a real sense of what the world thinks of the U.S.

What this market needs more than anything else is its own theme song, something that accurately reflects the current mood of investors. Here are a couple of ideas: "Upside Down" by Diana Ross, "Love Rollercoaster" by the Ohio Players, "Enter Sandman" by Metalica or "Sugar We're Going Down" by Fall Out Boy. None of them seem quite right though. If anyone has any suggestions, let me know.

Getting back to the market, stocks are headed down again. ADP Employer Services releases its report at 8:15 a.m. Eastern time, that may show that companies in the U.S. added 100,000 jobs in February, the slowest pace of increase since September, according to Bloomberg News. The Federal Reserve releases its beige book at 2 p.m. today. Meanwhile, stock futures are trading down.

How about "Signs" by the Five Man Electrical Band for the market's theme song?

In other news, Nikko Cordial Group's largest shareholder rejected Citigroup Inc. (NYSE:C) $10.8 billion buyout bid as too low. Several other big shareholders including Chicago-based Harris Associates made the same complaint, according to Bloomberg.

Dell Inc. (NYSE:DELL) in considering offering the free Linux operating system as an alternative to Microsoft Corp.'s (NASDAQ:MSFT) Windows. Consumers angry at Dell's poor quality machines now have an alternative to Microsoft's mediocre software.

FCC Chairman Kevin Martin has privately questioned recent testimony about Sirius Satellite Radio Inc.'s (NASDAQ:SIRI) acquisition -- not a merger -- of XM Satellite Radio Inc. (NASDAQ:XMSR), according to the New York Times. Martin questioned Sirius CEO's Mel Karmazin's claim that subscribers would get more programming for the same monthly rate.