October 19 – October 23 Week in Review
It was a mixed bag for the stock market last week. The S&P 500 declined 0.5%, largely due to a 2.2% decline in the high flying information technology sector. The Nasdaq Composite fell 1.1%, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 1.0%. The small cap Russell 2000 was the lone gainer, finishing with a 0.4% gain.
Stimulus talks took up a lot of headlines, but the main takeaway was that despite more progress achieved, the passage of a deal may have to wait until after the election. Of course, anything can happen between now and then, but Treasury Mnuchin said on Friday that significant differences still remained.
Of note last week was a possible change in investor sentiment. A rise in the yield of the 10 year Treasury favored the rate sensitive financials sector at the expense of many highly valued growth and technology stocks that had benefited from persistently low yields.
The communication services, utilities, and energy sectors also closed higher. The communication services sector was led by Snap's impressive earnings report as it surged 52% in the three days that followed its report.
Intel and Netflix were some notable earnings related laggards. The former also weighed on the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index.
Additionally, the following developments last week were supportive factors for cyclical stocks: news commentary that separate vaccines from Moderna and AstraZeneca could be available in December sometime after Christmas, better than expected economic data, and daily airline passenger levels reaching one million for the first time since early March.
As previously mentioned the 10 year yield rose ten basis points last week to 0.84% on inflation expectations. The 2 year yield closed higher by 3 basis points at 0.17%.
In other markets last week the U.S. Dollar Index declined 1.0% to 92.72, WTI crude closed lower at $39.78 a barrel and gold closed at $1,903.40 an ounce.
October 26 – October 30 Economic Calendar