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NEW YORK (awp international) – After a long period of lethargic trading, there was still a little momentum in the prices on Friday. The leading index Dow Jones Industrial made it to another high since mid-December in late trading. In particular, the shares of large banks increased according to quarterly reports from the industry. At the closing bell, the Dow gained a moderate 0.33 percent to 34,302.61 points. On a weekly basis, he brought it up by 2 percent, which was the best stock market week in two months.
Looking back on the trading week, analyst Stephen Innes of SPI Asset Management wrote that investors had been betting on stronger growth in Europe and China and a easing in inflation in the USA. A slackening of inflation will allow the US Federal Reserve to slow down the pace of interest rate hikes in the coming months.
The market-wide S&P 500 rose by 0.40 percent to 3999.09 points. The tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 rose more, up 0.71 percent to 11,541.48 points.
The prices of large banks, which had already published their quarterly reports before the starting bell, turned around astonishingly. JPMorgan, Citigroup, Bank of America and Wells Fargo kicked off their earnings season ahead of the weekend. If prices came under pressure in early trading, they turned back into the profit zone later on.
Most impressive was the turnaround in Wells Fargo stock. In the first few minutes of trading, the papers of the money house fell by 5.5 percent, but in the end they were up 3.3 percent. Similar, albeit less strong, were price patterns from Citigroup, Bank of America and JPMorgan. The latter even led the winners in the Dow with a premium of 2.5 percent. In the final quarter of 2022, the financial institutions exceeded market profit expectations.
Stock marketers rated the quarterly figures from Delta Air Lines as disappointing, the price of which fell by 3.5 percent. Above all, higher costs were criticized here. According to UnitedHealth’s quarterly report, the health insurer’s shares fell 1.2 percent.
Tesla shares fell by almost 1 percent. The US electric car pioneer is now apparently also reducing the prices for its vehicle models in Europe due to sluggish demand and tough competition. Tesla had already reduced prices in the USA the day before, and a few days ago in the important Chinese market. The shares of Ford and General Motors suffered even more with minus 5.3 and minus 4.8 percent respectively.
A sell recommendation from Goldman Sachs weighed on the shares in the armaments company Lockheed Martin, they lost 2.6 percent to almost 450 dollars. At the beginning of December, the paper had risen to a record high of almost $500.
Virgin Galactic shares soared more than 12 percent. Previously, the provider of flights for space tourists had promised to start commercial space operations in the second quarter of 2023.
The euro eased somewhat after its recent rally, trading at $1.0832 in late US FX trading. The European Central Bank had previously set the reference rate at $1.0814. The dollar had thus cost 0.9247 euros. Quotations on the bond market fell, the futures contract for ten-year bonds (T-Note Future) lost 0.38 percent to 114.80 points. In return, the yield on ten-year government bonds rose to 3.50 percent
— By Benjamin Krieger, dpa-AFX —
