The Dow has hit 20,000; now what?

New York

YES, it is just another number.

But in an industry that lives and dies by the power (seen and unseen) of sums in all their varieties, that the Dow Jones industrial average closed above 20,000 on Wednesday was enough to give even the most hardened stock market watchers reason to smile. The Dow finished the day at 20,068.51.

"It blows me away," said Jim Paulsen, chief market strategist at Wells Fargo Asset Management. "I can remember when …