Despite a fall at the end of the week, stocks rode a midweek push to finish in the black. Oil prices officially reached bear territory, hitting their largest price drop in many years. What looked like a very strong week ended with just minor gains for each of the indexes listed here. The Dow led the way, closing last week almost 3.0% ahead of its prior week’s value. The S&P 500 was close behind, gaining over 2.0%. Domestically, the tech stocks of the Nasdaq and the small caps of the Russell 2000 were hit hardest by last Friday’s sell-off, each index losing most of the gains achieved earlier in the week. Year-over-year, the Nasdaq continues to lead the way, followed by the Dow and the S&P 500. The Russell 2000, which had made considerable gains earlier in the year, has given most of them back. Feeling the ongoing effects of global-growth concerns, the Global Dow has lost value from its 2017 closing mark.
LAST WEEK’S ECONOMIC HEADLINES
- As expected, the Federal Reserve Open Market Committee refrained from raising the federal funds rate following its meeting last week. While describing economic activity and job gains as strong, the Committee noted that business investment has moderated. There is one more rate hike in the offing this year, which, if it occurs, would follow FOMC’s December 19 meeting.
- After reaching a high of 7.3 million job openings in August, the number of job openings fell by 284,000 in September, according to the latest Job Openings and Labor Turnover report. Notable job losses occurred in professional and business services (118,000), finance and insurance (82,000), and state and local government (67,000). The number of hires in September was 5.7 million, after reaching a revised series high of 5.9 million in August. There were about 5.7 million total separations, which includes quits, layoffs, and discharges. Overall, there were still many more job openings than those considered unemployed.
- While growth in the services sector continued to show strength in October, expansion slowed compared to September. According to the Non-Manufacturing ISM® Report on Business®, business activity, new orders, employment, and prices each grew in October, but at a slower pace than in the prior month.
EYE ON THE WEEK AHEAD