Global Market: Stock Bull-Market in sight with tech-fueled rally

An advance of almost 1.5% for the S&P 500 Friday extended the benchmark’s surge from its October low to nearly 20%. Broadcom Inc. climbed after predicting that sales tied to artificial intelligence will double this year. Amazon.com Inc. rose as Bloomberg News reported the company has been talking with wireless carriers about offering low-cost or possibly free nationwide mobile phone service to Prime subscribers.

Meantime, Wall Street’s reaction to the latest jobs report showed bets that another Fed hike is likely in the bag — but that wouldn’t necessarily happen in June. 

Signs of labor-market slackening in May despite a pickup in hiring could strengthen the argument from Chair Jerome Powell and other officials that they should take more time to assess incoming data and the evolving outlook before raising rates again. 

Two-year yields, which are more sensitive to imminent central bank moves, jumped 14 basis points to 4.48%. Swaps are pricing almost a quarter-point hike across the next two Fed meetings. But only nine basis points are projected for June, indicating a less than 50% chance of that happening this month.

“The key question now is: can they wait until July or does this monster payrolls number trigger another burst of urgency?” said Seema Shah, chief global strategist at Principal Asset Management. “Perhaps the report details, with the unemployment rate rising and average hourly earnings growth slowing, tilts the decision to July.”

Some of the main moves in markets:

Stocks

• The S&P 500 rose 1.3% as of 12:08 p.m. New York time
• The Nasdaq 100 rose 0.7%
• The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1.8%
• The Stoxx Europe 600 rose 1.5%
• The MSCI World index rose 1.4%

Currencies

• The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index rose 0.2%
• The euro fell 0.4% to $1.0720
• The British pound fell 0.5% to $1.2463
• The Japanese yen fell 0.7% to 139.80 per dollar

Cryptocurrencies

• Bitcoin rose 0.8% to $27,076.16
• Ether rose 1.2% to $1,891.5

Bonds

• The yield on 10-year Treasuries advanced eight basis points to 3.68%
• Germany’s 10-year yield advanced six basis points to 2.31%
• Britain’s 10-year yield advanced four basis points to 4.16%

Commodities

• West Texas Intermediate crude rose 2.4% to $71.77 a barrel
• Gold futures fell 1.1% to $1,974.50 an ounce

This story was produced with the assistance of Bloomberg Automation.

This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text.

Updated: 03 Jun 2023, 02:49 AM IST