(CercleFinance.com) – Wall Street attempted a timid rebound on Friday morning, driven in particular by energy stocks, after having fallen sharply the day before due to a new blow of bamboo concerning inflation.
A little over an hour after the opening, the Dow Jones advanced 0.4% to 35,382 points, while the Nasdaq Composite erased its gains from the start of the session to now show a stable evolution at 14,186.5 points.
The S&P 500 fell 1.8% yesterday, while the Nasdaq Composite fell more than 2% as the latest inflation figures bolstered expectations of further rate hikes.
In view of the indicators published in the morning, investors are wondering if inflationary pressures are not likely to have, in addition, an unfavorable impact on growth.
The University of Michigan’s US consumer confidence index fell to 61.7 this month from 67.2 in January, while economists were forecasting a figure around 67.5.
Unsurprisingly, Richard Curtin, the author of the survey, attributes this further deterioration in household morale to the rise in inflation, a worrying factor when you consider that consumption accounts for around 60% of US GDP.
For the time being, the good performance of the energy compartment nevertheless helps to eclipse the concerns surrounding the intensification of inflationary pressures.
The energy sector is benefiting from the jump in oil prices on the NYMEX (+1.8% to 91.5 dollars), while some OPEC+ countries are still reluctant to produce the quotas allocated to them.
Another element of support, the yield of 10-year Treasuries is falling towards the psychological threshold of 2% after rising to 2.05%, a new high of two years.
On the stock side, Under Armor fell more than 9% after warning that its margins would shrink this year due to soaring freight costs.
At this stage of the week, the Dow Jones is posting a relatively limited weekly decline of around 0.7%, while the Nasdaq is down nearly 1%, which is pushing the technology index back into ‘competition territory’. correction’ compared to its highs of last fall.
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