A highly volatile week ended on Friday when the stock market closed with all three major indexes at their lowest point of the calendar year. For the day, the Dow lost 1.3 percent, the S&P 500 lost 1.5 percent, and the Nasdaq lost 2.3 percent. For the week, the Dow was down 5.7 percent, the S&P 500 was down 6.4 percent, and the Nasdaq was down 8 percent.

Volatility is certain to rear its head in the upcoming week as investors struggle to comprehend what impact Greece’s monetary troubles will have on global banking. And nervous investors still need reassurance that last Thursday’s 1000-point intraday drop, the largest in market history, was the result of a glitch that will not be repeated.

Next Thursday’s initial unemployment claims are expected to decline by 4000 for the week, but the national unemployment rate has returned to 9.9 percent, despite the creation of 190,000 jobs in April.

Next Friday will bring three economic reports. April’s retail sales data, excluding autos, is forecast to have risen 0.4 percent over April 2009. The March figure showed an increase of 0.9 percent. April industrial production is expected to show an increase of 0.6 percent compared to the March increase of 0.1 percent, and the preliminary consumer sentiment reading for May is thought to have risen to 73.5 from April’s 72.2.

Ben Bernanke is scheduled to attend a Federal Reserve conference in Philadelphia on Thursday, and investors will be anxious to hear his comments afterward.

Dave Mecklenburg is the Editor-in-Chief of TigerSharkTrading.com.