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By Alex
Eule | Wednesday, December 2 Priced
In. Maybe this is what normal feels like.
On a day when the United Kingdom became the first Western country to approve a Covid-19 vaccine, investors
yawned. The Dow Jones Industrial
Average rose 60 points, or 0.2%, while the S&P
500 was up 0.2%. A few months
ago, if you had asked me to predict stocks' reaction to the first
vaccine approval, I would have said way more than a fraction of
1 percent. Today's small move indicates how much of our vaccine
progress had already been priced in to stocks in recent
weeks. Some of the
muted reaction can also be chalked up to continued uncertainty about a
potential stimulus deal in Congress. After yesterday's optimism, today
brought more questions about whether a compromise is possible in Washington.
For now, the answer still seems to be no. Economic
data was also a headwind on the day. The ADP jobs report showed that the private
sector created 307,000 new jobs in November, well below the 450,000
forecast by economists, as well as last month's 404,000 gain. In another
sign of how far we've come from pre-Covid debates, investors barely reacted
to President-elect Joe Biden's comments to the New York Times that he
had no immediate plans to cancel the 25% tariffs on Chinese imports.
Separately, the House of Representatives passed a bill today that could
force Chinese company stocks to be delisted from U.S.
exchanges. The bill, already passed by the Senate, is likely to be signed by
President Donald Trump. Tensions
with China aren't going away, and investors barely flinched. The S&P
500's small gain today was enough for another record close, the index's
28th this year. |
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DJIA: +0.20% to 29,883.79 The Hot
Stock: NetApp +9.4% Best Sector:
Energy +3.3%
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