All three of the major stock indexes were getting ready to cap off a successful November as U.S. stock futures increased on Thursday.
Up 206 points, or 0.6%, were futures linked to the Dow Jones Industrial Average. Both the Nasdaq-100 and S&P 500 futures increased by 0.3%.
On the strength of higher-than-expected results, Salesforce and Snowflake both saw gains of 9.2% and 8.6%. The fact that fresh data from Europe indicated inflationary pressures are abating also helped to improve sentiment on Thursday.
Even though the 30-stock Dow and the S&P 500 finished Wednesday’s trading session close to the flat line, they are still just roughly 0.5% and 0.8%, respectively, off their closing highs for the year. Though it lost 0.16% during the day, the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite is still 0.7% below its closing high for 2023.
The three-month losing record for the indices would come to an end if the major averages complete November with sizable gains. November has seen gains of 8.5% for the S&P 500 and over 11% for the Nasdaq. It looks like both averages will have their best month since July 2022. With the Dow up 7.2% in November, the month is expected to be the best since October 2022.
Even if interest rates are still higher than they were earlier in the year, strategist Jay Woods is not concerned that equities will lose their gains before the year is out.
In my opinion, the cycle has finished. We’ve recovered what we lost, and we’re now beginning to build on our goals from the peak of the market at the end of 2021, the chief global strategist of Freedom Capital Markets said to CNBC. “Price movement is in the green. The economic evidence provides a strong tailwind for the Fed’s decision to hold off on raising rates and even lowering them.
The estimate for personal consumption expenditures in October, a crucial inflation indicator used by the Federal Reserve, will be closely watched by traders. Also due are weekly unemployment claims.
Source (CNBC)
