US markets end sharply higher on Friday

01 Apr 2023 Evaluate

Magnifying their previous session’s gains, the US markets ended sharply higher on Friday with the tech-heavy Nasdaq showing a particularly strong upward move, reaching a six-month closing high. Sentiments on the Wall Street got a boost following the release of a Commerce Department report showing an unexpected slowdown in the annual rate of core consumer price growth. The report said core consumer prices, which exclude food and energy prices, jumped 4.6 percent year-over-year in February. Annual price growth remains elevated, but this represents a slowdown from the 4.7 percent year-over-year spike in January. Street had expected the pace of growth to be unchanged. Including food and energy prices, the annual rate of consumer price growth also slowed to 5.0 percent in February from 5.3 percent in January. The pace of overall growth was also expected to be unchanged.

The Commerce Department said consumer prices rose by 0.3 percent on a monthly basis in February following a 0.6 percent advance in January. Street had expected prices to increase by 0.4 percent. Core consumer prices also increased by 0.3 percent on a monthly basis in February after climbing by 0.5 percent in January. Core prices were expected to edge up by 0.2 percent. With the inflation readings said to be preferred by the Fed, the data led to some optimism the central bank will hold off on raising interest rates at its next meeting in early May. Recently, the Fed signaled that it expects just one more rate increase this year, leaving traders looking for clues about the timing of the final rate hike. Meanwhile, the monthly jobs report is likely to be in focus next week.

Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped 415.12 points or 1.26 percent to 33,274.15, Nasdaq surged 208.44 points or 1.74 percent to 12,221.91 and S&P 500 was up by 58.48 points or 1.44 percent to 4,109.31.

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