US markets end mostly higher on Wednesday

22 Feb 2024 Evaluate

The US markets ended mostly higher on Wednesday despite the minutes of the Federal Reserve's latest monetary policy meeting revealed most officials remain wary of cutting interest rates too quickly. The minutes of the late-January meeting said participants acknowledged risks to achieving the Fed's employment and inflation goals were moving into better balance, but they remained highly attentive to inflation risks. The Fed said in particular, they saw upside risks to inflation as having diminished but noted that inflation was still above the Committee's longer-run goal. Most participants subsequently highlighted the risks of moving too quickly to lower interest rates and emphasized the importance of carefully assessing incoming data in judging whether inflation is moving down sustainably to the Fed's 2 percent target.

On the sectoral front, despite the late-day recovery by the broader markets, networking stocks continued to see substantial weakness, dragging the NYSE Arca Networking Index down by 3.0 percent to its lowest closing level in over two months. Palto Alto Networks (PANW) led the sector lower, with the cybersecurity company plummeting by 28.4 percent after reporting better than expected fiscal second quarter results but lowering its forecast for full-year revenue growth. Computer hardware and software stocks also saw considerable weakness on the day, contributing to the lower closing by the tech-heavy Nasdaq. In the stock specific development, Shares of Nvidia have skyrocketed this year amid optimism about demand for its AI chips, but traders are wary of whether its results will support further upside.

Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 48.44 points or 0.13 percent to 38,612.24 and S&P 500 was up by 6.29 points or 0.13 percent to 4,981.8, while Nasdaq fell 49.91 points or 0.32 percent to 15,580.87.


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