Thursday's Market Minute: Tricks Or Treats?

The market reached its hands into the communal candy bowl yesterday and pulled out a heaping handful of…what exactly?

A better-than-expected first look at 3Q GDP was overshadowed by a hawkish Fed cut. Stocks were mostly unchanged when the 25bps cut to the fed funds range was announced and climbed to positive territory around 2PM during the press conference with chairman Jerome Powell. Key changes in Powell’s language indicate that after three cuts, the Federal Reserve is likely to hold off on any more unless under inflationary pressure.

An onslaught of postmarket earnings Wednesday showed strength out of big tech and consumer stocks. Facebook, Inc. FB reported 29% revenue growth y/y and anything but a declining user base: daily active users increased to 1.62B from 1.49B last year. And Apple Inc AAPL is flexing its services muscle: services sales grew 18% to $12.5B. Starbucks Corporation SBUX grew global comp. sales by 5% along with a 3% increase in average tickets.

Three of the four major indices, the Russell excluded, ended higher on the day. At 3046.77, the S&P 500 closed at its highest level yet, which seems to show the market is reveling in its good fortune of scoring full-size candy bars – or at least that there’s more chocolate than raisins.

Earnings still to come this afternoon and Friday: PINS PINS, BABA BABA, XOM XOM, CVX CVX.

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Image Sourced from Pixabay.