HONG KONG – U.S. stocks are drifting around their records Friday after data suggested the job market remains solid enough to keep the economy going, but not so strong that it raises immediate worries about inflation.
The S&P 500 rose 0.1% and was just above its all-time high set on Wednesday. It’s rolling toward the close of a third straight winning week in what’s likely to be one of its best years since the 2000 dot-com bust. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 115 points, or 0.3%, as of 12:53 p.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite climbed 0.6%.
Stocks held relatively steady as the latest jobs report strengthened expectations among traders that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates again at its next meeting in two weeks. While the report showed U.S. employers hired more workers than expected last month, it also said the unemployment rate unexpectedly ticked up to 4.2% from 4.1%.
“This print doesn’t kill the holiday spirit and the Fed remains on track to deliver a cut in December,” according to Lindsay Rosner, head of multi-sector investing within Goldman Sachs Asset Management.
The Fed began easing its main interest rate from a two-decade high in September to offer more help for the slowing job market, after bringing inflation nearly all the way down to its 2% target. Lower interest rates can ease the brakes off the economy, but they can also offer more fuel for inflation.
Expectations for a series of cuts from the Fed have been a major reason the S&P 500 has set an all-time high 56 times so far this year. And the Fed is part of a global surge: 62 central banks have lowered rates in the past three months, the most since 2020, according to Michael Hartnett and other strategists at Bank of America.
Still, the jobs report may have included some notes of caution for Fed officials underneath the surface.
Scott Wren, senior global market strategist at Wells Fargo Investment Institute, pointed to average wages for workers last month, which were a touch stronger than economists expected. While that’s good news for workers who would always like to make more, it could also keep upward pressure on inflation.
“This report tells the Fed that they still need to be careful as sticky housing/shelter/wage data shows that it won’t be easy to engineer meaningfully lower inflation from here in the nearer term,” Wren said.
So, while traders are betting on a nearly 90% probability the Fed will ease its main rate in two weeks, they’re much less certain about how many more cuts it will deliver next year, according to data from CME Group.
For now, the hope is that the job market can help U.S. shoppers continue to spend and keep the U.S. economy out of a recession that had earlier seemed inevitable after the Fed began hiking interest rates swiftly to crush inflation.
Several retailers offered encouragement after delivering better-than-expected results for the latest quarter.
Ulta Beauty rallied 9.7% after topping expectations for both profit and revenue. The opening of new stores helped it boost its revenue, and it raised the bottom end of its forecasted range for sales over this full year.
Lululemon stretched 18.3% higher following its own profit report. It said stronger sales outside the United States helped it in particular, and its earnings topped analysts’ expectations.
Retailers overall have been offering mixed signals on how resilient U.S. shoppers can remain amid the slowing job market and still-high prices. Target gave a dour forecast for the holiday shopping season, for example, while Walmart gave a much more encouraging outlook.
A report on Friday suggested sentiment among U.S. consumers may be improving more than economists expected. The preliminary reading from the University of Michigan’s survey hit its highest level in seven months. The survey found a surge in buying for some products as consumers tried to get ahead of possible increases in price due to higher tariffs that President-elect Donald Trump has threatened.
In tech, Hewlett Packard Enterprise jumped 11.1% for one of the S&P 500’s larger gains after reporting stronger profit and revenue than expected. Tech stocks broadly were one of the main reasons the S&P 500 climbed this past week, as Salesforce and other big companies talked up how much of a boost they’re getting from the artificial-intelligence boom.
In the bond market, the yield on the 10-year Treasury yield slipped to 4.16% from 4.18% late Thursday.
In stock markets abroad, France’s CAC 40 rose 1.3% after French President Emmanuel Macron announced plans to stay in office until the end of his term and to name a new prime minister within days. Earlier this week, far-right and left-wing lawmakers approved a no-confidence motion due to budget disputes, forcing Prime Minister Michel Barnier and his cabinet to resign.
In Asia, stock indexes were mixed. They rallied 1.6% in Hong Kong and 1% in Shanghai ahead of an annual economic policy meeting scheduled for next week.
South Korea’s Kospi dropped 0.6% as South Korea’s ruling party chief showed support for suspending the constitutional powers of President Yoon Suk Yeol after he declared martial law and then revoked that earlier this week. Yoon is facing calls to resign and may be impeached.
Bitcoin was sitting a little above $101,000 after briefly bursting above $103,000 to a record the day before.
___
AP Writers Matt Ott and Zimo Zhong contributed.
Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
