Wall Street ended the week slightly lower on Friday amid conflicting economic signals as traders and investors awaited a looming policy meeting of the Federal Reserve in the coming week.
Stocks seesawed through the week to Friday in continued volatile trade as investors sought to read the latest economic tea leaves.
Multiple reports showed that the US economy was expanding, albeit at a lackluster second quarter pace of 1.9 percent, that home prices continued to fall, as did car sales, and that job losses continued to mount.
While the latter reports appeared bleak on the surface, economists said job cuts of 51,000 last month were not nearly as bad as feared.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average of 30 blue-chip shares fell 0.39 percent in the week to Friday, to end at 11,326.32, while the broad-market Standard & Poor’s 500 index lost a more modest 0.20 percent to 1,260.31.
The technology-laden NASDAQ composite declined a scant 0.02 percent for the week to 2,310.96.
“The dog days of summer settled onto Wall Street,” said Al Goldman, a chief market strategist at Wachovia Securities, as trading wrapped up for the week.
“The major stock averages closed modestly lower on light volume. Readings on jobs, construction and manufacturing indicated tough times for the economy,” he said.
The Dow and other leading indexes have lost significant ground so far this year as a lingering housing slump, a credit crunch and soaring oil prices have weighed down the markets.
As Wall Street closed for business on Friday, traders said they were turning their attention to next week’s central bank meeting.
The Fed is widely expected to keep its key interest rate firmly pegged at 2 percent at a meeting set for Tuesday.
“The Fed will do nothing next week. Fed will keep fed funds at 2 percent, voice its concern about the longer term inflation threats from commodity prices,” said John Lonski, the chief economist at Moody’s Investor Service.
Investors said they will also be keeping a close eye on crude oil prices which rocketed to record highs over US$147 a barrel last month.
Traders said Wall Street sentiment was suppressed on Friday as big US automakers reported gloomy sales and as auto giant General Motors announced a US$15.5 billion quarterly loss.
GM’s loss was much bigger than expected and underlined its lingering troubles as it battles tumbling demand for its trucks and gasoline-guzzling sport utility vehicles.
Financial stocks are also likely to remain on the radar in the coming week as major banks seek to continue trimming their balance sheets of ailing investments.
Bond prices rose on the week as investors sought a safe haven from stocks. The yield on the 10-year Treasury bond declined to 3.948 percent from 4.111 percent a week earlier and that on the 30-year bond dropped to 4.569 percent from 4.696 percent.
Aside from the Fed meeting, market participants said the economic news flow will slow a little in the coming week with reports due on personal income and spending, factory orders, consumer credit and jobless claims.
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
China's military today said it began joint army, navy and rocket force exercises around Taiwan to "serve as a stern warning and powerful deterrent against Taiwanese independence," calling President William Lai (賴清德) a "parasite." The exercises come after Lai called Beijing a "foreign hostile force" last month. More than 10 Chinese military ships approached close to Taiwan's 24 nautical mile (44.4km) contiguous zone this morning and Taiwan sent its own warships to respond, two senior Taiwanese officials said. Taiwan has not yet detected any live fire by the Chinese military so far, one of the officials said. The drills took place after US Secretary
THUGGISH BEHAVIOR: Encouraging people to report independence supporters is another intimidation tactic that threatens cross-strait peace, the state department said China setting up an online system for reporting “Taiwanese independence” advocates is an “irresponsible and reprehensible” act, a US government spokesperson said on Friday. “China’s call for private individuals to report on alleged ‘persecution or suppression’ by supposed ‘Taiwan independence henchmen and accomplices’ is irresponsible and reprehensible,” an unnamed US Department of State spokesperson told the Central News Agency in an e-mail. The move is part of Beijing’s “intimidation campaign” against Taiwan and its supporters, and is “threatening free speech around the world, destabilizing the Indo-Pacific region, and deliberately eroding the cross-strait status quo,” the spokesperson said. The Chinese Communist Party’s “threats
RSS