US markets end lower on Friday

10 Dec 2022 Evaluate

The US markets ended lower on Friday as traders looked ahead to next week's highly-anticipated Federal Reserve meeting. While the Fed is widely expected to slow the pace of interest rate hikes to 50 basis points, traders have recently expressed concerns about how much further the Fed will need to raise rates in order to contain inflation. Traders may pay close attention to the Fed's accompanying statement, although a lot of key data will be released before the next meeting in late January/early February. Adding to concerns about the outlook for interest rates, the Labor Department released a report showing U.S producer prices increased by more than expected in the month of November.

The Labor Department said its producer price index for final demand rose by 0.3 percent in November, matching upwardly revised increases in October and September.  Street had expected producer prices to inch up by 0.1 percent compared to the 0.2 percent uptick originally reported for the previous month. On the sectoral front, energy stocks moved sharply lower over the course of the session, with a continued decrease by the price of crude oil weighing on the sector. With crude for January delivery falling $0.44 to $71.02 a barrel, the Philadelphia Oil Service Index plunged by 3.8 percent and the NYSE Arca Oil Index dove by 2.2 percent. Considerable weakness also emerged among biotechnology stocks, as reflected by the 1.7 percent slump by the NYSE Arca Biotechnology Index.

Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 305.02 points or 0.9 percent to 33,476.46, Nasdaq dropped 77.39 points or 0.7 percent to 11,004.62 and S&P 500 was down by 29.13 points or 0.73 percent to 3,934.38.

© 2026 The Alchemists Ark Pvt. Ltd. All rights reserved. MoneyWorks4Me ® is a registered trademark of The Alchemists Ark Pvt. Ltd.

×