PARIS (Reuters) – The New York Stock Exchange opened lower on Thursday, affected by fears over the evolution of interest rates while awaiting an intervention from Jerome Powell in the evening and the publication on Friday of a key indicator of inflation in the United States.
About ten minutes after the first exchanges, the Dow Jones index lost 19.45 points, or 0.06%, to 33,530.82 points and the Standard & Poor’s 500, broader, fell by 0.04% to 4,272, 5 points.
The Nasdaq Composite lost 0.22%, or 29.18 points, to 13,063.66.
The monthly PCE price index in the United States, the preferred measure of inflation by the Federal Reserve (Fed) is due to be published on Friday and the Reuters consensus forecasts an acceleration to 0.5% in August from one month on other and at 3.5% annually.
While several Fed officials continue to warn of a continuation of high rates over a long period, Jerome Powell’s speech, scheduled for 8:00 p.m. GMT, is particularly anticipated.
Soaring energy prices are also fueling the prospect of persistent inflation, with Brent at a more than one-year high near $100 a barrel.
On the economic side, if the American GDP for the second quarter was confirmed to increase by 2.1% at an annualized rate, the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA), the government agency which prepares the report on GDP, revised the data of every first quarter of 2020 to 2022 due to downward revisions mainly in consumer spending.
In stocks, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, sensitive to changes in interest rates, fell from 0.8% to 1.7% while the yield on ten-year US Treasury bonds continued to rise, by more than three basis points, at 4.6716, at a 16-year high.
Micron Technology fell 5.24%, with the semiconductor maker forecasting a sharper-than-expected net loss in the first quarter of its fiscal year.
HP Inc is in the red as Berkshire Hathaway sold new shares of the PC maker.
From a sector perspective, new technologies (-0.41%) and real estate (-0.41%) are among the biggest decliners, while energy is on track to be the only major index of the S&P-500 to make gains over the entire month.
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(Writing by Claude Chendjou, edited by Kate Entringer)
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