(CercleFinance.com) – Wall Street continued its upward momentum on Friday morning, the return of risk appetite seeming to be confirmed after the episode of high volatility experienced in recent weeks.
At the end of the morning, the Dow Jones advanced 0.8% to 32,912.5 points, while the Nasdaq Composite rose more than 2.2% to cross the 12,000 point mark.
Investors continue to benefit from the relief linked to the publication, a little earlier this week, of ‘minutes’ from the Fed considered rather encouraging.
In its minutes, the central bank left the door open to a potential pause in its rate hikes by the end of the year, in order to orchestrate a soft landing for the economy.
After having lined up seven consecutive weeks of decline, the American markets therefore seem well on their way to posting their first weekly increase since the end of March.
At current levels, the Dow Jones is currently posting a gain of more than 5% for the week as a whole, the S&P 500 is up 5.7% and the Nasdaq is climbing more than 6%.
The markets confirmed their rebound despite the solid statistics published in the morning, yet likely to justify a rise in interest rates and therefore harm equities.
These indicators continue to reflect the dazzling health of US consumption, which for the moment seems little affected by the surge in inflation.
Published this morning, household spending increased by 0.9% in April compared to the previous month, where the consensus envisaged an increase of 0.7%.
These figures did not cause any surge in bond yields, far from it: the ten-year American returns in the direction of 2.72% after finishing at 2.76% the day before.
It must be said that the most anticipated figure concerned the annualized rate of increase in the PCE price index (‘basket of the housewife’), which fell by 0.3 points to + 6.3% in data total, and at +4.9% excluding energy and food.
Volatility also confirms its decline: the CBOE’s VIX index, known as the fear index, returns well below the 30-point threshold, supposed to illustrate great nervousness in the markets.
In terms of stocks, Dell Technologies climbed more than 11% after beating market expectations in the past quarter on the strength of its business computers and networking solutions.
Gap for its part dropped 5% after having revised downwards its annual forecast following a disappointing quarter, marked by a surge in its manufacturing costs.
Still in distribution, Costco Wholesale changed little (+0.5%), its solid quarterly results being offset by margins under pressure and increasing stocks.
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