U.S. stocks traded higher on Thursday with the main benchmarks headed for back-to-back gains as investors digested a batch of upbeat economic data.
How stocks are trading
-
S&P 500
SPX
rose 26 points, or 0.6%, to 4,167. -
Dow Jones Industrial Average
DJIA
advanced 82 points, or 0.3%, to 33,055. -
Nasdaq Composite
COMP
advanced 111 points, or 0.9%, to 12,543.
On Wednesday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average
DJIA
rose 60 points, or 0.18%, to 32969, the S&P 500
SPX
increased 12 points, or 0.29%, to 4141, and the Nasdaq Composite
COMP
gained 50 points, or 0.41%, to 12432. The S&P 500 is up 12.9% from its mid-June low but remains down 13.1% for the year to date.
What’s driving markets
U.S. stocks opened mostly higher on Thursday following revised readings on the performance of the U.S. and German economies during the second quarter, along with more fiscal stimulus measures out of China.
A revised reading on second-quarter gross domestic product showed Germany’s economy grew by 0.1% in the second quarter, which was better than economists had expected. Meanwhile, in the U.S., the first revision of second-quarter GDP figures showed the economy shrank by just 0.6%, better than the 0.9% contraction from the original reading.
See: GDP shrank at 0.6% annual pace in second quarter, but it wasn’t all bad news
Stocks are also contending with low trading volume. Wednesday’s session saw just 8.8 billion shares traded across the various Wall Street exchanges. That was the lowest volume so far this year and a decline of 26% compared with the daily average for 2022, according to Dow Jones data.
Market strategists blamed the low trading volume on seasonal factors, as well as the reluctance among some investors to make bold bets before Fed Chairman Jay Powell speaks on Friday at the Kansas City Fed’s annual economic symposium in Jackson Hole, Wyo.
Investors will dissect Powell’s comments for clues about the direction of Fed policy, an issue that has greatly determined market trajectory of late.
“Markets maintained their holding pattern, ahead of an important couple of days which should provide further short-term directional clues,” said Richard Hunter, head of markets at Interactive Investor.
Susannah Streeter, senior investment and markets analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown, said that “the nervousness which swept through indices earlier in the week has been kept at bay. The expectation that the U.S. Federal Reserve will keep hiking rates to beat down inflation has already been priced in to some extent”.
In other economic news, the number of Americans who applied for unemployment benefits last week fell to a one-month low of 243,000, indicating layoffs remain near record lows.
See: Jobless claims fall to one-month low of 243,000 with no sign of surging layoffs
Investors were also contending with a decidedly mixed bag of earnings reports from a handful of tech companies released after Wednesday’s closing bell. Shares in Nvidia
NVDA
were flat while Salesforce
CRM
were down nearly 7%. Snowflake
SNOW,
on the other hand, was up more than 16% after its numbers and forecasts were well-received.
How are other assets faring
-
Oil futures were steady with U.S. crude
CL
up just 0.1% to $94.96 a barrel. -
The 10-year Treasury yield
BX:TMUBMUSD10Y
was marginally lower at 3.108%. -
The ICE Dollar index
DXY
fell 0.1% to 108.59, while gold
GC00
rose 0.4% to $1,767 an ounce. -
Bitcoin
BTCUSD
advanced 1.8% to $21,746. -
Asia markets got an added lift from the latest stimulus in China. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng
HK:HSI
rose 3.6% and the Shanghai Composite
CN:SHCOMP
climbed 1%. In Europe, the Euro Stoxx 600
XX:SXXP
was roughly flat.
