The New York Stock Exchange ended in scattered order on Thursday, recovering in part following four consecutive sessions of losses for the indices, on the eve of a highly anticipated US employment report.
According to final results, the Dow Jones index, which spent most of the session in the red, finally rose 0.46% to 31,656.42 points.
The Nasdaq remained behind, but far from its lowest in the session, dropping 0.26% to 11,785.13 points. The tech-heavy index slipped below 12,000 points for the first time in five weeks.
The broader S&P 500 index climbed 0.30% to 3,966.85 points.
“The mood shunned risk ahead of the jobs report” on Friday, Wells Fargo analysts summed up, while Schwab analysts said the mixed performance of stock indexes came as a counterpoint “to rising bond yields and dollar”.
“The tightening of financial conditions comes as markets expect an increase in aggressive monetary policy from the Fed,” they explained.
Usually, the first day of a new month brings fresh money to the market “but so far capital inflows are hardly flowing in September,” noted Patrick O’Hare of Briefing.com. .
Investors are awaiting the crucial figure for job creation and unemployment for August, which will be published on Friday shortly before the opening of Wall Street.
Analysts are betting on 300,000 new hires and an unemployment rate stable at 3.5% following the very strong figures for July (half a million job creations) which surprised the market.
If the jobs report were to be better than expected, “it would likely strengthen the case for a third consecutive Federal Reserve interest rate hike of 75 basis points” later in the month, Patrick warned. O’Hare.
– Tension in the bond market –
The bond market tightened, with rates on ten-year US Treasury notes climbing to 3.25%. Those at two years were also up at 3.50%.
On the front of the indicators, weekly jobless claims fell to 232,000 to the surprise of analysts, showing a job market still tight.
The ISM manufacturing activity index for August remained close to its lows since 2020, while coming in better than expected at 52.8%.
Internationally, the bad news came from China where the metropolis of Chengdu (southwest), which has more than 20 million inhabitants, is subject to confinement, as part of the policy of Beijing has zero tolerance for Covid-19.
These paralysis of activity raise fears for demand but also for the functioning of the supply chain, particularly in electronic components.
Oil prices fell more than 3%.
The end of the session allowed more sectors to return to green, with only three out of eleven S&P sectors remaining in the red: energy (-2.30%), materials (-1.38%) and information technology (-0.48%).
Listed, semiconductor maker Nvidia fell 7.67% to $139.37 following indicating that new US limitations on the export to China of chips used for intelligence tools would affect its sales.
Its competitor AMD fell 2.99%.
Micron Technology, on the other hand, gained 1.38% to 57.31 dollars. The semiconductor maker will invest $15 billion over the next 10 years to build a memory chip manufacturing facility in Boise, Idaho (northwest).
The agri-food group Campbell Soup dropped 2% despite results for the 4th quarter in line with forecasts but down sharply over one year.
Sportswear and equipment maker Lululemon, which ended down 1.84%, rallied almost 8% in electronic trading following the close, following raising its sales and profit estimates for the year.
On Monday, the stock market will be closed in the United States for the Labor Day holiday.