US markets end mostly higher on Thursday

22 Oct 2021 Evaluate

The US markets ended mostly higher on Thursday with S&P 500 reaching a new record closing high. The strength on markets came after a report from the Labor Department showed first-time claims for US unemployment benefits unexpectedly edged lower in the week ended October 16th. The Labor Department said initial jobless claims slipped to 290,000, a decrease of 6,000 from the previous week's revised level of 296,000. The modest decrease surprised participants, who had expected jobless claims to inch up to 300,000 from the 293,000 originally reported for the previous week. With the unexpected dip, jobless claims once again fell to their lowest level since hitting 256,000 in the week ended March 14, 2020.

Further, support also came in as the National Association of Realtors (NAR) released a report showing existing home sales rebounded by much more than expected in the month of September. NAR said existing home sales spiked by 7.0 percent to an annual rate of 6.29 million in September after slumping by 2.0 percent to a rate of 5.88 million in August. Street had expected existing home sales to jump by 3.6 percent to a rate of 6.09 million. Existing home sales reached their highest annual rate since January but were still down by 2.3 percent compared to the same month a year ago. Besides, upbeat earnings reports also contributed to the continued advance, with shares of Tesla (TSLA) moving notably higher after the electric car maker reported better than expected third quarter results.

Nasdaq surged 94.02 points or 0.62 percent to 15,215.7 and S&P 500 was up by 13.59 points or 0.3 percent to 4,549.78, while Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 6.26 points or 0.02 percent to 35,603.08. 

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