Wall Street’s main indexes slipped on Friday after strong jobs data on hopes of another big interest rate hike by the US Federal Reserve later this month.
According to a Reuters poll of economists, the Labor Department report showed an increase of 372,000 jobs in non-farm payrolls in June, more than an estimated increase of 268,000 jobs.
The report also showed the unemployment rate remained close to pre-pandemic at 3.6% and average hourly earnings rose 0.3%, after rising 0.4% in May, all pointing to strength in the labor market.
“Certainly, this reinforces the outlook that there’s going to be 75-basis-point growth over the next two weeks,” said Tom Plumb, portfolio manager at Plumb Balanced Fund.
“We are still where bad news is good news and good news is bad news…
Atlanta Fed President Rafael Bostic, until recently one of the central bank’s top-most policymakers, said on Friday that he “fully” supports another 75 basis point increase later this month.
Fed Governor Christopher Waller and St. Louis Fed Chairman James Bullard said on Thursday they would support another 75-basis-point rate hike, but anticipate a slow downside move later.
After the first half of the year, US stock markets started July on solid footing as investors took respite from easing commodity prices and the Fed pointed to a more restrained schedule of rate hikes amid recession concerns.
The S&P 500 and Nasdaq posted higher levels for the fourth time in a row on Thursday, while the three main indices were on track to post weekly gains.
Rate-sensitive shares of high-growth companies such as Microsoft Corp, Amazon.com Inc and Nvidia Corp fell nearly 1% as US Treasury yields jumped.
At 09:48 am, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 68.69 points, or 0.22%, at 31,315.86, the S&P 500 was down 18.45 points, or 0.47%, at 3,884.17, and the Nasdaq Composite was down 87.57 points, or 0.75 points. %, at 11,533.78.
Levi Strauss rose 2.1% after the company’s second-quarter results beat estimates, helped by strong demand for its denim jeans and jackets.
Twitter Inc fell 4.6% after a report said Elon Musk’s deal to buy the social media company is in “grave danger”.
GameStop Corp fell 7.5% after the video game retailer terminated the employment of chief financial officer Michael Ricupero.
The number of issues has increased, declining to a 2.00-to-1 ratio on the NYSE and a 1.52-to-1 ratio on the Nasdaq.
The S&P index recorded a new 52-week high and 29 new lows, while the Nasdaq recorded eight new highs and 11 new lows.
This story has been published without modification in text from a wire agency feed. Only the title has been changed.