Benchmark indexes soared after the labor market expanded at a moderate pace in December raising hopes of peaking inflation and slowing down the pace of interest rate increases.
With two jobs reports highlighting strong labor market and a third report on the way on Friday, stocks turned lower and benchmark indexes are set to extend weekly losses to the fifth.
Benchmark indexes traded lower after two reports confirmed the ongoing tight labor market conditions and expanding payrolls as private businesses continue to add jobs.
Stocks on Wall Street traded lower on the final trading day of 2022 and benchmark indexes posted the worst losses since 2008. The highly immune evasive mutating XBB omicron subvariant family virus is rapidly spreading in the U.S.
Stocks staged a rebound and major averages soared 2% on the back of a rally in tech stocks. Crude oil dropped 2% on the worries that the rapid rise in China's Covid-infections may spread to the rest of the world.
Investors focus on the upcoming earnings releases in two weeks and weighed the earnings outlook in a slowing global economy against the resilient U.S. consumer and reopening in China.
The rise in U.S. Treasury yields sapped market sentiment and dragged tech stocks lower. China-linked stocks traded higher on reopening optimism but Tesla and Apple fell to one-year lows.
Stocks lacked direction in holiday-shortened last week of 2022 as investors focused on portfolio rebalancing and weighed economic outlook and earnings revisions.
The Nikkei index in Tokyo closed higher following the easing of U.S. inflation. Governor Kuroda stressed that the recent yield band widening move is not the end of ultra-loose monetary policy. China indexes gained despite the rapid spread of Covid infections.
