After last year’s biggest decline in stock markets since 2008, this year’s recovery has helped make 2023 performance numbers increasingly powerful, with a spurt towards the end of the year. Buyers continued to dominate yesterday, even as the S&P 500 Index gained just 0.04%, taking the broad index to 4,783 points, 13 points away from the record set in early 2022 (up 24, 6% year to date in dollar terms). The Nasdaq 100, on the other hand, has already repeatedly broken new record levels and was ready to do so yesterday too, but had to settle for a decline of 0.1% in the final minutes, after having nevertheless achieved a return in dollars of 54.5 %. the beginning of this year. In Europe, the result of the Stoxx 600 index remained at -0.1% yesterday, reducing the euro’s rise since the beginning of the year to 12.5%.
In the United States, 218 applications for unemployment benefits were filed last week, up 12,000 from the previous week and also exceeding the consensus forecast of 210,000. The total number of aid recipients increased from 1.861 million to 1.875 million in the week ending December 16, in line with consensus forecasts and remaining near a two-year peak (1.925 million). The arrival of new applications shows that the level of dismissals continues to remain low, but the increase in the total number of beneficiaries indicates that it will not be easy to find a place in the job market again. If the economy continues to cool, sooner or later companies should also think more about reducing headcount instead of freezing the hiring of new employees.
The U.S. pending home sales index was unchanged in November from October, marking its lowest level since data was collected in 2001 (analysts had expected a 0.9 percent monthly increase). Builders and sellers have pointed out that the drop in the 30-year mortgage interest rate from 8.09% in October to 6.93% today has increased the interest of potential buyers in the market, but statistics show that this does not it still led to more active transactions.
Asian stock markets were mixed overnight, with the Nikkei down 0.2% and the Hang Seng down 0.2%, but the Shanghai Composite rallied 0.6%. Brent crude fell 1.2% to $77.4, Bitcoin held steady at $42,538 and Ethereum rallied 0.4% to $2,356. The EUR/USD exchange rate rose by 0.1% to 1.1074 dollars and the ounce of gold stood at 2,074.3 dollars (+0.4%).
The last stock market day of the year will be rather quiet as far as economic news is concerned, with only the December change in Spanish inflation and the December activity index of the Chicago manufacturing industry in the United States on the table.
10.00 Spanish inflation (December)
16.45 Chicago US Manufacturing PMI (December)
2023-12-29 06:10:22
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