(New York) Between the momentum of Microsoft’s strong earnings and worries for the banking sector, the New York Stock Exchange ended without direction and on the defensive on Wednesday.
The Dow Jones index dropped 0.68% to 33,301.87 points, the tech-heavy NASDAQ advanced 0.47% to 11,854.35 points and the broader S index
The American regional bank First Republic continued its descent into hell (-29.75%), raising concerns about a tightening of credit conditions in the United States.
“The bullish wave after strong Microsoft results,” released after the close on Tuesday, “helped lift major indexes in the morning […] but concerns about banks persisted and reignited risk aversion,” summed up Schwab analysts.
Initially reassured by the positive announcements from Microsoft and Alphabet, investors lost enthusiasm in the second part of the session with the continued collapse of First Republic.
The listing of this Californian bank has been suspended many times on the NASDAQ. Its stock closed down 29.75% to a low of $5.69, having already halved the previous day on news that it lost 100 billion in deposits in the first quarter.
“First Republic is fighting for its survival and trying to get help from big banks, but its future is bleak,” said Edward Moya analyst for Oanda. Especially, according to him, that “the government does not seem to want to intervene”.
“It’s probably premature to think that the whole banking sector has problems as big as First Republic’s, because overall deposit and lending conditions have stabilized,” said Hugh Johnson of Hugh Johnson Economics.
But the economist nevertheless judges that “the combination of higher interest rates and some deterioration in loan conditions implies that we could suffer a hard landing in the economy”, he indicated to the AFP.
Microsoft saved the day on the NASDAQ, soaring 7.24% to $295, after publishing quarterly results that were significantly better than expected the day before, boosted by its remote computing business.
In addition, the title of Microsoft hardly seemed to suffer from the rebuff inflicted by the British competition authorities, which announced on Wednesday blocking its acquisition of the giant of online video games Activision.
“We remain fully committed to this acquisition and will appeal,” Microsoft said in a statement to AFP about the $69 billion deal.
The title of Activision Blizzard, which notably publishes the successes “Call of Duty”, “World of Warcraft” and “Candy Crush”, plunged more than 11%.
Alphabet, which also announced Tuesday after the close, quarterly results exceeding expectations, remained stable (-0.15%).
Meta soared (9.84%) in electronic trading after the close on Wednesday, after finishing just in the green (0.89%). After the close, Facebook’s parent company posted a quarterly profit that was down (-24%), but above expectations.
The Dow Jones was supported for a while thanks to Boeing (0.42%). The aircraft manufacturer announced a worse-than-expected first-quarter loss on Wednesday, but confirmed its guidance for the full year.
The index of star stocks, on the other hand, was weighed down by the health insurer UnitedHealth (-1.82%), but also by the DIY chain Home Depot (-2.79%) as well as the financial services of Goldman Sachs (-0.86%) and Visa (-0.63%).
The top performer of the day in the market went to Mexican-inspired fast-food chain Chipotle, which soared 12.91% to 2009 dollars. It saw its turnover at the number of comparable restaurants increase by 10%, as much as its prices.
Declines in the energy and industrials sectors forced the Toronto Stock Exchange’s benchmark index to close lower on Wednesday, while major U.S. indexes ended in mixed order.
The composite index S
In the currency market, the Canadian dollar traded at an average rate of 73.39 cents US, down from 73.41 cents US on Tuesday.
On the New York Commodities Exchange, crude oil prices fell US$2.77 to US$74.30 a barrel, while natural gas fell 13 cents US to US$2.31 a million. of BTUs.
The price of gold left US$8.50 at US$1996.00 an ounce and that of copper depreciated less than 1 US cent to US$3.86 a pound.
