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By Nicholas
Jasinski | Monday, January 3 A
Superlative Start. Investors rang in the
new year by pushing stock indexes to records today. The S&P
500 and Dow
Jones Industrial Average rose 0.6% and 0.7%, respectively, to notch
all time highs. The Nasdaq
Composite popped 1.2%, to within a
percentage point and a half of its own record high. The Federal
Reserve's policy stance is still
flooding markets with liquidity, Omicron cases are growing, but appear
to be mild, and the outlook for economic and earnings growth in 2022 remains
positive. Those are all the standard bullish talking points that have boosted
stock indexes to their latest record highs. On the other hand are the familiar
concerns: U.S. monetary policy support is beginning to be withdrawn,
inflation is a wild card, and higher bond yields threaten to spoil the party
for highly valued stocks. Those all appeared to be on the back burner for
today. Treasuries also kicked
off 2022 with big moves, as the closely watched 10-year
Treasury yield added 0.13 percentage point, to 1.63%. That's the highest
the note's yield has been since late November. The two-year yield,
meanwhile, rose 0.05 percentage point today, to 0.78%. That's the
highest it has been since March 2, 2020, in the very early innings of the
Covid-19 market turbulence. Higher rates were good news for bank stocks
today: The SPDR S&P Bank exchange-traded fund (KBE) jumped 2%. Energy stocks also had a strong day, with
the Energy Select Sector SPDR ETF (XLE) up
3.1%. The U.S. price of crude oil rose 1.2% today, to $76.08 a barrel.
That's the eighth gain in the past nine trading days, and brings oil to about
10% below its late-October highs just under $85 a barrel. The price is
up some 60% over the past year. Consumer discretionary shares in the S&P
500 gained 2.9% today, thanks to a 13.5% jump from Tesla stock. The electric-vehicle pioneer said
over the weekend that it delivered 308,600 cars and SUVs in the last
three months of 2021. That was well ahead of analysts' average forecast and
marks a record quarter for Tesla. Wall Street had plenty of nice things to say
about the result: "Jaw-dropping,” “supercharged,” “blowout,” and
“fireworks” are all terms used by analysts as compiled by Al
Root. Read more from Barron's
resident EV expert on Tesla's latest
report here
and here. Barron's is now accepting nominations for the third
annual Barron's 100 Most Influential Women in U.S. Finance.
The deadline for submissions is Jan. 15, 2022. Apply here. |
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DJIA: +0.68% to
36,585.06 The Hot Stock: Tesla +13.5% Best Sector: Energy +3.1% |
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