The US markets ended in red on Thursday on Hawkish comments from Federal Reserve officials also dented recent optimism about the outlook for interest rates. St. Louis Fed President James Bullard suggested the central bank's aggressive interest rate hikes have had only limited effects on observed inflation. Bullard said the Fed will need to continue increasing interest rates to reach a level that could be considered sufficiently restrictive. Some weakness also prevailed in the markets as report released by the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia showed regional manufacturing activity unexpectedly contracted at a faster rate in the month of November. The Philly Fed said its diffusion index for current activity tumbled to a negative 19.4 in November from a negative 8.7 in October, with a negative reading indicating a contraction in regional manufacturing activity. The decrease by the Philly Fed index came as a surprise to participants, who had expected the index to inch up to a negative 6.2.
Meanwhile, new residential construction in the U.S. showed a notable decrease in the month of October, the Commerce Department revealed in a report released. The report said housing starts tumbled by 4.2 percent to an annual rate of 1.425 million in October after falling by 1.3 percent to an upwardly revised rate of 1.488 million in September. Street had expected housing starts to slump by 2.0 percent to an annual rate of 1.410 million from the 1.439 million originally reported for the previous month. On the sectoral front, Gold stock showed a significant move to the downside on the day, dragging the NYSE Arca Gold Bugs Index down by 2.0 percent. Considerable weakness was also visible among utilities stocks, as reflected by the 1.9 percent drop by the Dow Jones Utility Average.
Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 7.51 points or 0.02 percent to 33,546.32, Nasdaq dropped 38.7 points or 0.35 percent to 11,144.96 and S&P 500 was down by 12.23 points 0.31 percent to 3,946.56.
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