Traders on Wall Street appear to be having a hard time gauging what omicron means for stock prices. On Thurs, US equities rebounded sharply, following a two-day omicron-driven selloff. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 617.75pts, or 1.82%, to close at 34,639.79. The S&P 500 index rose 1.42%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite advanced 0.83%. The small cap Russell 2000 gained 2.74%.
Dow component Boeing’s (BA US) shares jumped 7.5% after China cleared the 737 Max to return to fly.
The 10-year Treasury note yield notched up 4.07 basis points (bps) to 1.4443%.
The money market curve is now twisted. While Eurodollar futures are pricing in multiple rate hikes in 2022 and 2023, the spread between the Dec 2024 and Dec 2025 futures is negative, indicating the possible Fed rate cuts in 2025.
The iShares iBoxx High Yield Corporate Bond ETF (HYG US) rose 0.74%. The CBOE Volatility Index (VIX) fell to 27.95 on Thur from Wed’s 31.12.
Apple (AAPL US, -0.61%) told its parts suppliers that expected iPhone 13 orders may not materialize next year, according to Bloomberg. Users may be skipping the latest models and waiting for the next upgrade.
Tech-maker Marvell Technology (MRVL US, +0.11%) soared 17.57% in afterhours trade on Thur after company’s 4Q forecast beat analyst estimates.
The most actively traded US gold futures (Feb) contracts settled down $21.60, or 1.2%, at US$1,762.70/oz. March silver, which is the most actively traded silver futures, fell 2.3 cents, or 0.1%, to end at US$22.316/oz.
The ICE dollar index (DXY), which measures the strength of the greenback against a basket of currencies, rose 0.13% to 96.156.
The front-month Brent and WTI futures closed up 80 cents at US$69.67/bbl and 93 cents at US$66.50/bbl respectively.
European equity markets finished lower on Thur. The UK FTSE lost 0.55%, France's CAC 40 fell 1.25%, while the German DAX retreated 1.35%.