Wall Street opens higher, still looking for a rebound

The New York Stock Exchange opened higher on Thursday, once again looking for a rebound after two sessions of decline. Around 3:00 p.m. GMT, the Dow Jones gained 0.95%, the Nasdaq index, under the influence of technology stocks, took 1.64%, and the broader S&P 500 index, 1.10%. For Patrick O’Hare, investors started the session with “the faith that the market has fallen too far and will afford a rebound”, explained the analyst, in a note, “the same catalyst as the day before”.

On Wednesday, unable to maintain their momentum throughout the session, the three indices had ended in the red, the Dow Jones chaining its fourth consecutive decline. As for the Nasdaq, it has entered the correction zone, which means that it has lost more than 10% since its last record in mid-November. Wall Street reacted little to the higher than expected figure for weekly jobless claims, which came out at 286,000 against 225,000 expected. This is the third increase in a row for the indicator.

This unpleasant surprise was offset by the surprise acceleration of manufacturing activity in the Philadelphia region, whose index stood at 23.2 points in January, while economists were counting on only 18.5. “There is a wave of purchases” after the crossing of technical thresholds downwards, commented Peter Cardillo, of Spartan Capital Securities.

The analyst pointed out that after a few lackluster publications, notably from banks JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs, most of the other big names who have come forward since have reported satisfactory figures and forecasts. “When we get into full earnings season next week, maybe then the market will start to focus on that rather than on rising rates,” Cardillo said.

American Airlines down

After crossing 1.90% on Wednesday for the first time in just over two years, the benchmark rate for 10-year US government bonds eased on Thursday to 1.83%. On the list, American Airlines lost 2.02% to 16.96 dollars, after the publication of a quarterly turnover better than expected as well as a lower loss than expected. The company nevertheless warned that the spread of the Omicron variant of the coronavirus had disrupted the rebound in passenger traffic.

The day before, its competitor United Airlines (-0.82% to 44.04 dollars) had made the same observation. The title was sanctioned after the group announced that the ability ramp-up was going to be slower than expected. First tech giant to enter the competition, Netflix (+0.80% to 519.99 dollars) will publish its results after the stock market. Penalized by the slide in growth stocks as well as by the emergence of its competitors on streaming, the platform has dropped more than 26% on the stock market since its peak in mid-November.

The Nasdaq was driven by Apple (+1.52%), Microsoft (+2.54%) and Alphabet (+1.46%), but also by Chinese stocks, boosted by the announcement of a rate cut one-year director of the People’s Bank of China. The Chinese behemoths of online commerce Alibaba (+5.39%), JD.com (+7.70%) or Pinduoduo (+6.49%) were thus at the party.

Many computer technology heavyweights, such as semiconductor manufacturers AMD (-1.46%) or memory card specialist Micron (-1.65%), however, were still looking gloomy. The American insurer Travelers (+4.24% to 166.86 dollars) was sought after having published a turnover and a profit well above forecasts. The group also announced the release of a new envelope of 5 billion dollars intended for share buybacks.