US markets end mostly lower on Thursday

18 Jun 2021 Evaluate

The US markets ended mostly lower on Thursday following the broad-based weakness seen in the previous session. The closely-watched Federal Reserve meeting Wednesday spurred a sell-off in equities after the central bank moved up its timeline for rate hikes, seeing two increases in 2023. The central bank also hiked its inflation forecast to 3.4% for the year, a percentage point higher than the Federal Open Market Committee’s forecast in March. Adding to the bearish sentiment, the Labor Department released a report showing an unexpected uptick in initial jobless claims in the week ended June 12th. The report said initial jobless claims rose to 412,000, an increase of 37,000 from the previous week's revised level of 375,000.

The increase surprised participants, who had expected jobless claims to edge down to 359,000 from the 376,000 originally reported for the previous week. Jobless claims had declined in eight out of the nine previous weeks, falling to their lowest levels since March of 2020. However, suggesting strong economic growth will continue in the near term, the Conference Board released a report showing another significant increase by its index of leading US economic indicators. The Conference Board said its leading economic index surged up by 1.3 percent in May, matching the revised jump in April as well as Street estimates. The matching increases follow a 1.4 percent spike in March.

Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 210.22 points or 0.62 percent to 33,823.45 and S&P 500 was down by 1.84 points or 0.04 percent to 4,221.86, while Nasdaq rose 121.67 points or 0.87 percent to 14,161.35.

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