NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- U.S. stock markets opened slightly loweraafter a report from the Commerce Department showed U.S. gross domestic product grew 3.5% in the third quarter, beating economists' estimates. Third-quarter GDP was forecast to rise just 3% this quarter after a 4.6% increase in the second quarter. Thursday's report served to reinforce the Federal Reserve’s outlook as it ends its monthly bond-buying, known as quantitative easing. Falling unemployment, rising GDP and corporate earnings show the U.S. economy to be growing at a steady and strengthening pace. Inflation and wage growth, however, remain below normal trends. The S&P 500 Indexaopened lower by 0.04%, while theaNasdaq and Dow Jones Industrial Averageaopened lower bya0.14% and 0.06%, respectively. The increase in GDP reflected strong consumption trends, rising exports and government spending at the federal, local and state levels, the Commerce Department said. The data comes as readings on consumer confidence ahead of the holiday season hit a seven-year high, and may reflect strong growth prospects for the U.S. heading into 2015. The report also showed falling inflation, indicating that even as the U.S. economy grows above trend inflation remains benign. The price index for GDP purchases rose just 1.3% in the third quarter, a drop from the 2% rise recorded in the second quarter. Excluding food and energy prices, inflation rose 1.5% compared with an increase of 1.7%. Initial jobless claims from Thursday morning showed weekly claims rose slightly more than forecast to 287,000 from 283,000 the previous week. Claims, nonetheless, sit near multi-year lows and come as the U.S. unemployment rate dipped below 6% in September, the lowest level since 2008. Strong GDP data could impact investors’ thinking on the Federal Reserve’s timetable for a hike in short-term interest rates, however, inflation data remains below the central bank's targets. The Fed on Wednesday confirmed it was ending its monthly bond-buying program and provided a stronger-than-expected outlook on the U.S. labor market and economy. On balance, a range of labor market indicators suggests that underutilization of labor resources is gradually diminishing," the central bank said. The yield on the 10-year U.S. Treasury was falling, hitting 2.29%, while gold was falling more than 1.5% to $1,203 a troy ounce. ”[T]he Fed does appear a bit more confident in the momentum of the underlying economy with improvement in the labor market and household spending,” said Lindsey Piegza, chief economist at Sterne Agee. Guy Lebas, chief fixed income strategist at Janney Montgomery Scott, said he expects the Fed to begin raising interest rates in September 2015. Apple CEO Tim Cook confirmed he is gay in an editorial published in BusinessWeek. "We pave the sunlit path toward justice together, brick by brick. This is my brick," Cook said. MasterCard and Visa both reported better-than-forecast third quarter earnings, with shares in the payments giants rising over 7% and 8%, respectively. Royal Dutch Shell said Thursday that third-quarter profit fell 4.5% to $4.46 billion but rose 24% to $5.27 billion when stripping out the impact of fluctuations in the price of oil. Shares opened little changed at $70.99. Teva Pharmaceutical beat third-quarter earnings forecasts, reporting a profit of $1.32 a share, exceeding estimates of $1.24 a share. Teva shares were rising 1.24%. Conoco-Phillips also reported better-than-expected third-quarter earnings of $1.29 a share, beating estimates by 8 cents. The oil driller’s earnings were bolstered by asset sales. Shares fell over 1% to $69.62. Coffee chain Starbucks is expected by analysts on Thursday to report fiscal fourth-quarter earnings of 74 cents a share on revenue of $4.23 billion. GoPro is expected to report earnings of 8 cents a share after the markets close on Thursday, while LinkedIn is expected to earn 47 cents a share in the third quarter. -- Written by Antoine Gara in New York Follow @AntoineGara // 0;if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js";fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); // ]]>
Click to view a price quote on ^DJI.
from Latest TSC Headlines http://feeds.thestreet.com/~r/tsc/feeds/rss/latest-stories/~3/NBl3QQYeihk/stock-market-today-stocks-dip-as-gdp-rises-35-visa-surges.html
No comments:
Post a Comment