(CercleFinance.com) – Wall Street is expected to open lower on Friday for the last session of a trying year for US equity markets in 2022, as the S&P 500 index is on track to post its worst annual performance since 2008.
Half an hour before the opening, the ‘futures’ contracts on the major New York indices yield between 0.4% and 1%, announcing a negative opening, like the past year.
The 2022 financial year has so far ended with a fall of 19.2% for the S&P, the main benchmark for managers, with a decline of around 8.5% for the Dow Jones and a drop of more than 33 % for the Nasdaq Composite.
The performance of the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq contrasts with their jump of 26.9% and 21% respectively in 2021, when they took advantage of the economic recovery following the Covid epidemic.
This year, soaring inflation, monetary tightening by the Fed and the deterioration in the economic situation have weighed heavily on the indices, despite the good resistance of consumption in the United States.
The trend has been particularly affected by the decline in major technology stocks, which have so far benefited from the near-zero interest rates that have allowed investors to generate solid returns in the sector.
The high-tech compartment was thus one of the main contributors to the general downward trend in American stock markets this year, with an S&P sector index down 29%.
But it is stocks related to telecoms (-41%) and non-essential consumption (-37%) that have suffered the most this year.
Wall Street also lost ground due to the strength of the dollar, which increased the prices of goods and services marketed by the most export-oriented American companies.
The greenback is nevertheless preparing to end 2022 on a weak note, around 1.0670 against the euro.
The decline in the dollar does not prevent oil from moving into the red, which means that US light crude (West Texas Intermediate, WTI) should end the year at about the same level as it began. .
On the bond market, yields on US government bonds are rising again before the New Year. whole year.
As is often the case at this time of year, trading should be sparse and the few players present on the eve of New Year’s Eve may not necessarily react to the announcement of the publication of the PMI index. of Chicago, scheduled shortly after opening.
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