NEW YORK (awp international) – At the end of a strong week on the US stock market, prices on the Nasdaq technology exchange in particular rose sharply again on Friday. In doing so, they defied indications that US interest rates would rise even more in the future and the continued lack of progress in negotiations between Russia and Ukraine. In the last few meters, the indices expanded their daily gains, which should also have something to do with the big expiration day on the stock exchanges this Friday.
The Nasdaq 100 index closed 2.14 percent higher at 14,420.08 points. In contrast, the gains in the standard value indices were more modest: the market-wide S&P 500 was ultimately enough for a plus of 1.17 percent to 4463.12 points, while the Dow Jones Industrial needed some time to shake off its losses. At the close of the market, the leading index recorded a price increase of 0.80 percent to 34,754.93 points. He managed a weekly plus of almost five and a half percent.
At the end of the week, high-ranking representatives of the US Federal Reserve spoke out in favor of a rapid tightening of American monetary policy. The president of the regional central bank of St. Louis, James Bullard, wants to raise the US interest rate to more than three percent this year. Fed Chair Christopher Waller doesn’t like to go quite that far. However, he suggested at least thinking about stronger interest rate hikes. The Fed raised its key interest rate this week for the first time since the end of 2018 in order to curb the high inflation of almost eight percent recently.
Most recently, US President Joe Biden and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping spoke on the phone about Ukraine. China is Russia’s most important ally, but shows a certain detachment in attacking Ukraine. Xi Jinping appealed to Biden to work together with the People’s Republic for peace in the world. “The crisis in Ukraine is something we don’t want to see,” Xi Jinping said, according to a report by state broadcaster CCTV. As permanent members of the UN Security Council and major world economies, both states should also “take on international responsibilities and make efforts for peace and tranquility in the world.”
The American side initially gave no information about the course of the call. On Thursday, Washington again warned China not to support Russia with military equipment in the war against Ukraine. In such a case, the US would not hesitate to impose “costs” on China, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said, alluding to possible sanctions.
Meanwhile, options and futures on the US indices and individual stocks expired in the last hour of trading on the big expiry day. Larger market players often try to influence prices in the desired direction before the expiry date. This often leads to larger price fluctuations.
In the case of individual values, business figures and analyst comments caused price swings. Although the logistics group Fedex benefited from the ongoing boom in online orders, it fell short of analysts’ expectations in the most recent financial quarter, despite significantly increased profits and sales. The shares lost almost four percent.
The shares of Gamestop, which are particularly popular with risk-taking private investors, increased by around three and a half percent after initial losses. The video games retailer closed the fourth business quarter with a decline in earnings and thus missed analysts’ expectations. However, sales were higher than forecast.
The share certificates of the navigation device manufacturer Garmin rose by more than two and a half percent. They were helped by an upgrade by Bank of America, which now recommends buying.
The euro, which had strengthened somewhat recently, fell to 1.1049 US dollars. The European Central Bank had set the reference rate at 1.1008 (Thursday: 1.1051) dollars; the dollar had cost 0.9084 (0.9049) euros.
US government bonds expanded their initially moderate price gains: Most recently, the futures contract for ten-year Treasuries (T-Note Future) rose by 0.26 percent to 124.66 points. The yield on ten-year government bonds was 2.15 percent, below its peak this week since mid-2019
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