A trader works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange on Aug. 4, 2022.
Source: NYSE
Stocks erased earlier losses in thin trading on Thursday after the market’s strong back-to-back gains at the start of the holiday week.
The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite both wiped off earlier losses to trade near the flatline. The Dow Jones Industrial Average traded 40 points higher after losing as much as 182 points earlier in the session. The market was closed on Wednesday for Christmas Day.
Thursday’s action came after a solid Christmas Eve for the S&P 500. The benchmark’s 1.1% gain on Tuesday marked its best Christmas Eve performance since 1974, according to Bespoke. So far this week, the S&P 500 is up 1.8%, while the Dow has gained 1%. The strong rally in megacap tech lifted the Nasdaq up 2.3% week to date.
Investors were enthusiastic about the so-called Santa Claus rally, which occurs in the last five trading days of the year and the first two in January. Since 1950, the S&P 500 has generated an average return of 1.3% during this period, widely outpacing the market’s average seven-day return of 0.3%, according to LPL Research. Thursday marks the second day of the Santa rally.
“The Santa Claus Rally may be alive and well. We’ll see, or it could be tough sledding,” Michael Zinn, UBS Wealth Management’s senior portfolio manager, said on CNBC’s “Squawk Box.” “It’s a sleepy time of year. The institutions aren’t really trading. It’s a little bit more retail driven. So what happens at the end of the year is not necessarily an indicator for how January and February go.”
On the data front, jobless claims for the week ended Dec. 21 totaled 219,000, compared to the 225,000 consensus forecast from Dow Jones. However, continuing claims, or recurring applications for unemployment benefits, rose to 1.91 million, reaching the highest level since Nov. 13, 2021.
Month to date, the S&P 500 is up by 0.1%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq has rallied 4.2%, thanks to the strong gains in Tesla, Apple and Alphabet. The blue-chip Dow, however, is down about 3.6% in the meantime, on track for its worst month since April.
Toyota shares on track for best day since March 2020 following ROE report
Shares of Toyota Motor rose more than 8% in morning trading, putting the stock on pace for its largest percentage increase in more than four years.
If the stock closes around this level, that would mark its best day since Mar. 17, 2020, when it gained more than 9%. The stock is also on pace for its sixth straight positive session.
The move comes on the heels of a Nikkei report, which cited an executive who asked not to be named, that said the Japanese automaker is aiming to double its return on equity (ROE) – a measure of profitability – to 20%.
TM, 1-day
While the stock has risen more than 14% in the past month, it’s underperformed the broader market this year, rising more than 7% year to date.
— Sean Conlon
Crypto ETFs under pressure
Crypto markets appear to be suffering a bit of a holiday hangover.
The iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) was down 2.9% in morning trading, while the iShares Ethereum Trust (ETHA) was down 4.6%. Unlike the underlying digital coins, crypto exchange-traded funds did not trade on Christmas, so their move reflects the declines in those markets since Tuesday.
Crypto assets like ether were struggling on Thursday.
Bitcoin was trading at just under $96,000 on Thursday, according to Coin Metrics, and is now down about 1% for the week.
— Jesse Pound
Space tech company KULR Technology rallies 37% on bitcoin purchase
Space technology company KULR Technology rocketed more than 37% Thursday after it said it bought 217.18 bitcoin worth about $21 million. Earlier, it gained as much as 43%.
Thursday’s bitcoin purchase was the first for the company since it announced a new bitcoin treasury initiative on Dec. 4, the day bitcoin hit the $100,000 level for the first time. Later, it rallied to a new record above $108,000, according to Coin Metrics, but has been down for the past week and is now 11% off that high.
KULR Technology buys bitcoin, sees shares rally as much as 43%
KULR’s newly acquired bitcoin came at an average price of about $96,556.53 a coin, the company said. The company plans to allocate up to 90% of its surplus cash to bitcoin, borrowing a page from MicroStrategy’s playbook.
— Tanaya Macheel
Holiday season sales up 3.8% from a year ago, Mastercard says
Shoppers were ready, willing and able to spend this holiday season, according to Mastercard SpendingPulse. The firm, which tracks spending across all payment types, said retail sales rose 3.8% between Nov. 1 and Dec. 24, compared with the same period a year ago.
“Solid spending during this holiday season underscores the strength we observed from the consumer all year, supported by the healthy labor market and household wealth gains,” said Michelle Meyer, chief economist at the Mastercard Economics Institute.
Still, shoppers were motivated by promotions and were definitely buying with value in mind. That may have prompted the late burst of buying during the season. About 10% of sales were rung up during the last five days before Christmas.
Online shopping grew even more popular this year, with e-commerce sales rising 6.7% year over year, while in-store purchases bumped up only 2.9%. Notably, apparel was a key e-commerce purchase, which could mean more returns for retailers this season.
In trading Thursday, the SPDR S&P Retail ETF (XRT) was up 0.22%. It has risen nearly 12% year to date.
— Christina Cheddar Berk
Jobless claims little changed, but continuing claims at 3-year high
Initial filings for unemployment insurance were little changed last week, though the ranks of the long-term unemployed appeared to rise, the Labor Department reported Thursday.
Jobless claims totaled 219,000 for the week ending Dec. 21, just 1,000 below the previous period and less than the 225,000 consensus forecast from Dow Jones.
However, continuing claims, which run a week behind, rose to 1.91 million, an increase of 46,000 and the highest level since Nov. 13, 2021.
Extended duration of unemployment has been on the rise for most of this year. Those out of work for 27 weeks or longer totaled 1.66 million in November, the highest since January 2021, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
— Jeff Cox
Stocks making moves before the bell
These are some stocks making big moves in the premarket on Thursday:
- GameStop — Shares jumped more than 4%, extending their gains from Tuesday. The video game retailer has risen four straight days and climbed more than 77% in 2024.
- Crypto stocks — Stocks linked to the price of bitcoin moved lower as the cryptocurrency slid on Thursday. Shares of bitcoin proxy MicroStrategy fell about 3%, and crypto services provider Coinbase dropped about 2%. Bitcoin miner Riot Platforms pulled back more than 2%.
- Honda — U.S.-listed shares rose more than 4%, bringing this week’s advance to about 14%, on the heels of merger talks announced at the start of the week with fellow Japanese automaker Nissan. The move also comes amid a rally among Asia-Pacific stocks following a report that Japan’s government is reportedly set to propose a record $735 billion budget.
Read here for the full list.
— Sean Conlon
Stocks head for winning week
Stocks are on track to finish the holiday-shortened trading week in the green as of Thursday morning.
The technology-heavy Nasdaq Composite has led the way, advancing more than 2%. The broad S&P 500 and blue-chip Dow have each climbed more than 1%.
If those gains hold through Friday’s close, it would snap a three-week losing streak for the Dow. That has marked the Dow’s longest period of back-to-back weekly declines since March.
— Alex Harring