US markets end slightly higher on Friday

14 Jul 2018 Evaluate

The US markets end slightly higher on Friday with major indexes extending a recent rally and the Dow reclaiming the 25,000 mark for the first time in nearly a month. Markets wobbled in morning trading, but rising oil prices helped energy companies, and defense contractors and machinery makers also rose. Consumer-focused companies like Amazon set record highs. Traders were also digesting mixed quarterly results from financial giants JPMorgan Chase (JPM), Citigroup (C) and Wells Fargo (WFC). Some support came in with the Federal Reserve delivering its semi-annual monetary policy to Congress, offering few surprises. The Fed described economic growth in the first half of the year as solid and reiterated it expects further gradual increases in interest rates. The Federal Reserve remains positive on the U.S. economic outlook with barely any mention of the trade or yield curve worries that are preoccupying markets.

Meanwhile, the University of Michigan released a report showing an unexpected decrease in consumer sentiment in the month of July on account of concerns about potential impact of tariffs. The preliminary report said the consumer sentiment index dipped to 97.1 in July from the final June reading of 98.2. Street had expected the index to come in unchanged. Besides, a separate report released by the Labor Department showed an unexpected decrease in import prices in the month of June but a slightly bigger than expected increase in export prices. The Labor Department said import prices fell by 0.4 percent in June after climbing by an upwardly revised 0.9 percent in May. The pullback surprised participants, who had expected import prices to inch up by 0.1 percent compared to the 0.6 percent increase originally reported for the previous month. On the other hand, the report also said export prices rose by 0.3 percent in June following a 0.6 percent increase in May. Street had expected export prices to edge up by 0.2 percent.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 94.52 points or 0.38 percent to 25019.41, the S&P 500 added 3.02 points or 0.11 percent to 2801.31 and the Nasdaq was up by 2.06 points or 0.03 percent to 7825.98.

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