How To Play President Obama's Speech

Tonight is the big night, with President Obama giving his jobs speech before a joint session of Congress in an effort to spur the sluggish American economy. While some details of the speech have leaked out, there is some hope that Obama and his administration still have some policies that we have not heard mentioned before. Otherwise, there is not too much to get excited about from

Last month, we had

in this country. That is pathetic, and the first time it has happened since the end of World War 2. Obama's speech has to be long on ideas, and short on rhetoric, otherwise, we could be in for more months like August. Worse, we could even see months where we lose jobs, as we did during the financial crisis of 2008. If Obama's policies are not immediately attacked by the Republicans, and there is a fair amount of common ground, then perhaps we can get some kind of job growth in this country. Yes, we still need the housing sector to rebound to give us any kind of traction, but something is better than 0. We are probably not going to hear anything about the housing sector in tonight's speech, but we will all be listening. "He will make the case very aggressively that measures he puts forward ... are the kinds of things that will help spur economic growth, that will lead to greater and faster job creation in the United States," White House spokesman Jay Carney said yesterday. Much of the talk seems to be centered on perhaps an infrastructure bank, tax cuts for the middle class, and transfer payments from the federal government to state and local governments to help with constant deficits. With the

fresh in many people's minds, there may not be anything said about alternative energy, but this is an issue that Obama has talked about extensively. The reason? Obama sees alternative energy as his "dot-com era." Everyone always talks about how President Clinton had a budget surplus, superior employment, and a raging stock market. Well, that's because we were ushering in a new era known as the "dot com era." We have not seen that kind of innovation in years, and Obama was hoping that alternative energy would be similar. So far, it has failed, and failed miserably. There has been much talk about an infrastructure bank, and while Obama may suggest that tonight, it is incredibly hard to implement. It will take years to get up and running. That is the reason why no President ever really pushes hard for it. They know they will not see the fruits of their labor in the near-term, so why bother? In total, Obama's package could cost anywhere from $300 billion to $400 billion, so obviously there are ways to play it. Here are a few ways to profit off of Obama's job speech.

Traders who believe that Obama's infrastructure plan will gain approval from both sides might want to consider the following trades:

Traders who believe that Obama's speech will be more of the same may consider alternate positions: