Wall Street ends higher, the S&P 500 at a new record

The New York Stock Exchange ended the session in the green on Thursday, after mixed macroeconomic data, recovering losses from the beginning of the week and allowing the S&P 500 to reach a new record.

The broader index, the most representative of the New York market, gained 0.58% to stand at 5,029.73 points. The Dow Jones gained 0.91% to 38,773.12 points and the technology-dominated Nasdaq advanced 0.30% to 15,906.17 points.

The session began in disarray in reaction to disappointing retail sales in the United States in January.

Purchases by American households thus fell by 0.8% in January compared to the previous month, due to a reduction in purchases of automobiles and construction materials in particular. Analysts expected a more modest drop, of around 0.2%, according to the consensus published by Briefing.com.

December data was also revised downwards, with sales increasing by only 0.4%, compared to 0.6% initially announced.

Added to these data was industrial production in January, down 0.1% in January, especially depressed by the construction sector.

“These figures also followed a worse-than-expected performance in the UK’s GDP and Japan falling into recession,” noted Art Hogan of B. Riley Wealth Management.

In the fourth quarter, Japanese GDP contracted again (-0.1% over one quarter). The United Kingdom entered recession in the second half of last year, with its gross domestic product falling by 0.3% in the fourth quarter.

Bond yields fell on the announcement of this information in the morning, with the ten-year rate sliding to 4.21% instead of 4.25% the day before.

But after the publication of other mixed indicators, “sometimes surprising on the upside”, according to Karl Haeling of LBBW, bond rates returned very close to their levels of the day before, inviting investors who had started cautiously, to start again. ‘Before. Around 9:30 p.m., the ten-year rate stood at 4.24%.

Thus, the Federal Reserve’s regional surveys on the Philadelphia and New York (Empire State) regions saw manufacturing activity improve.

As for weekly applications for unemployment benefits, they fell to their lowest level in a month at 212,000.

“This mix of cold and hot calls for a soft landing” of economic activity, which pleases the market, said Karl Haeling.

For Peter Cardillo of Spartan Capital, “weak retail sales prevented a rise in bond yields which gave the stock market a reason to recover Tuesday’s losses.”

Wall Street then misdigested the CPI inflation index for January, which was stronger than expected.

On the value side, the world leader in agricultural equipment Deere, which recorded an 11% decline in its quarterly net profit and lowered its projections for the current financial year, fell by 5.20% to $364.77. .

The telecommunications giant Cisco, which announced the loss of several thousand jobs, lost 2.43%.

The Californian company announced quarterly revenue of $12.8 billion, down 6% compared to the same period last year.

It also reported a profit of $2.6 billion, a decline of 5%.

Cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase climbed 3.30% as bitcoin continues to rise, recently surpassing the $50,000 threshold for the first time in more than two years.

Coinbase was expected to announce its quarterly results after the market close.

Shares of Lyft, the car rental company with driver, posted a good performance for the second day in a row (+16.11%) after encouraging results.

The Roku streaming channel fell 15% in electronic trading after the close after gaining 3.57% during the session. However, its results exceeded expectations with 80 million subscribers.