[ad_1]
Stocks open on Wall Street on Wednesday with solid gains led by tech shares after Microsoft announced stunning results for its last quarter. The decisive rise in early trading after several days of volatile fluctuations has been a welcome relief as investors try to gauge whether the Federal Reserve will succeed in its new effort to fight inflation. The Fed will release its final policy statement late Wednesday. It is expected to continue to withdraw stimulus measures before raising interest rates in the coming months. The S&P 500 was up 1.2% and the Nasdaq was up 1.9%. Treasury yields remained stable.
THIS IS A LAST NEWS UPDATE. The previous story of the AP is below.
NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stock futures posted solid gains as investors wait to hear more details from the Federal Reserve on its anti-inflation plans.
The Future of Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1% to 34,512.00. S&P 500 futures were up 1.3% and Nasdaq futures were up 1.9%.
Markets in Europe showed strong gains, with CAC 40 in France and DAX in Germany each up more than 2%. Markets in Asia were mixed. Japan’s Nikkei fell 0.4%, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index closed with a small gain.
The Fed is expected to signal at the end of its two-day meeting on Wednesday that it will raise the short-term benchmark interest rate in March, as high inflation is pressing on consumers and businesses. There is some concern at a Wall Street press conference that Fed Chairman Jerome Powell may suggest that the central bank will raise interest rates four times this year than most economists expect.
For nearly two years, investors had poured money into the stocks, confident that the Federal Reserve would help keep share prices steep. With the disappearance of this support, there was a fluctuation in the markets. The S&P 500 is down 8.6% so far this year.
At the same time, tensions in Russia and Ukraine continue to draw attention.
Ukrainian leaders assured their countries that an invasion from neighboring Russia was not imminent, but acknowledged the threat was real and received shipments of US military equipment to bolster their defence.
Moscow has denied it was planning an attack, but in recent weeks has gathered an estimated 100,000 troops near Ukraine and is holding military exercises in many parts of Russia. This prompted the United States and its NATO allies to rush to prepare for a possible war.
“Market volatility remains high as investors are still nervous about the tense situation between Ukraine and Russia, a host of inflationary issues including a potentially aggressive Fed, and a global chip issue that will not get better,” said Edward Moya. Oanda said in a comment.
Meanwhile, the pandemic still hovers over the economy, threatening to curb progress with each new wave of infections.
Local cases of COVID-19 reported in China have dropped, but some people are wary of spreading infections with next week’s Lunar New Year holiday and the Beijing Winter Olympics kicking off on February 4.
Earlier this week, the International Monetary Fund cited the omicron variant as the reason it lowered its forecast for global economic growth this year.
Mizuho Bank said in a report that this is “consistent with the interrupted and dampened recovery from the pandemic.” “Tensions in the supply chain, troubling escalation and expansion of inflation, and stuttering reopening due to the (COVID) micron variant are on the list of ‘usual suspects’ for the fainter recovery in 2022,” he said.
In energy trading, benchmark US crude rose 20 cents per barrel to $85.80 in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It rose from $2.29 to $85.60 on Tuesday. Brent crude, the basis for pricing international oil, rose 29 cents to $88.47 a barrel.
[ad_2]
Source link