Oil prices are rising, and US bond yields are also reaching their highest level since 2002. The hope of one less interest rate hike this year still gives investors confidence.
Dusseldorf. Solid economic data from the previous day is keeping investors happy. The major indices on Wall Street are largely starting Thursday trading with a plus.
The Dow Jones standard stocks gained 0.4 percent to 51,172 points.
The broad S&P 500 hardly moves and remains at 7677 points.
Meanwhile, the Nasdaq technology exchange moved up 0.5 percent to 26,985 points.
The Nasdaq 100, a reflection of the 100 non-financial companies with the highest market capitalization, rose by 0.5 percent to 30,556 points.
Yesterday, Wednesday, the US Department of Commerce published important inflation data for the US Federal Reserve (Fed). The price index for personal consumption expenditure (PCE) remained at 3.4 percent in August. This was a lower value than analysts expected - but the level remains high. The data fuels hopes that the Fed could forgo another interest rate hike in October.
Meanwhile, Wall Street is ignoring Micron's recent stimulus. The US memory chip manufacturer announced surprisingly high targets for the current quarter on Wednesday after the New York stock market closed. After the start of trading on Thursday, the shares were trading just slightly in the red.
For Jochen Stanzl, chief market analyst at Consorsbank, this is no coincidence. Micron still owes the artificial intelligence (AI) industry a new impetus. “If it is no longer enough to exceed all expectations in terms of profit, sales and outlook, this can be an indication that all of this has already been anticipated in the prices,” explains Stanzl.
For many buyers there is therefore no need to buy in straight away. “The hope that Micron's balance sheet could spark new AI euphoria to distract the market from its fixation on returns has not materialized,” writes the Consorsbank analyst.
Because yields on the US bond market are rising significantly. The ten-year US government bond climbed to 5.34 percent - the highest level since 2002. The background is concerns about inflation due to rising oil prices as a result of the war in the Middle East: Economists expect this to result in longer-lasting inflation and correspondingly higher key interest rates from the US Federal Reserve. Investors therefore sell existing bonds and demand higher interest rates for new ones - this depresses the prices of old bonds and drives up yields.
Rising bond yields have a negative impact on the stock business because safe government bonds suddenly have more attractive interest rates than many dividends or price gains - this means investors are evaluating growth stocks such as tech stocks more strictly. Thomas Altmann, portfolio manager at QC Markets, is already seeing the consequences in market behavior: “Buyers are currently becoming more and more of a minority on the stock market,” says Altmann.
Meanwhile, there are strong fluctuations in the oil market. After initial losses, oil prices rose on Thursday afternoon. A barrel (159 liters) of Brent crude oil from the North Sea for delivery in December was last traded at $100, after the price had temporarily fallen to $96.55 in the morning.
The strong price fluctuations on the oil market are explained by the fact that investors have to weigh up between higher delivery volumes from the crisis region in the Persian Gulf and the possibility of a further escalation in the Iran war.
