LDN - Business

Global stock index edges up, dollar dips after US inflation reading

[January 27, 2024] By Sinéad Carew and Marc Jones

NEW YORK/LONDON (Reuters) -MSCI's global stock index barely rose on Friday while the U.S. dollar edged down after the U.S. Federal Reserve's favored inflation reading showed moderating prices and investors waited anxiously for clues on interest rate policy days ahead of the central bank's closely monitored meeting.

Treasury yields rose on concerns about the growing supply of government debt, with next week's Federal Reserve meeting in focus and expectations that the Fed will have to address efforts to reduce its balance sheet.

The personal consumption expenditures (PCE) price index increased 0.2% last month after an unrevised 0.1% drop in November, the Commerce Department's Bureau of Economic Analysis said. In the 12 months through December, the PCE price index increased 2.6%, matching November's unrevised gain.

Still, pending U.S. home sales shot up in December by the most since June 2020, indicating prospective buyers may be getting drawn from the sidelines by stabilizing mortgage rates.

"Broadly this week we got a nice support for the soft landing scenario," said Mona Mahajan, principal and senior investment strategist, Edward Jones, New York citing Friday's inflation reading, Thursday's strong GDP data and improving manufacturing and services data earlier in the week.

But Mahajan detected jitters ahead of the Fed's meeting, ending on Jan. 31, as the central bank will likely "acknowledge the better inflation and economic data but may still push back on the markets pricing of six rate cuts this year".

"Investors are in wait and see mode," she said, adding that regarding inflation, the Fed "will probably not yet declare mission accomplished".

The MSCI world equity index, which tracks shares in 49 nations, gained 0.08%, after earlier hitting its highest level in almost two years. For the week it was showing a 1.3% gain.

Wall Street indexes were a mixed bag with the S&P 500 snapping a 5-session streak of record closing highs, falling 3.19 points, or 0.07%, to 4,890.97 on the day.

For the week the benchmark index added 1% while the Nasdaq added 0.9% and the Dow industrials advanced 7%, with all three clocking their third weekly gain in a row and their 12th weekly gain out of the last 13 weeks.

For Friday's session, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 60.30 points, or 0.16%, to 38,109.43, and the Nasdaq Composite lost 55.13 points, or 0.36%, to 15,455.36.

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Traders work on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York City, U.S., January 19, 2024. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo

Europe's equity index earlier closed up 1.1%, marking a 3% gain for the week, which was its biggest weekly percentage advance since the week starting Oct. 30.

This was after the European Central Bank (ECB) signaled on Thursday that it could cut rates by April. While ECB chief Christine Lagarde said it was "premature" to discuss easing, money markets priced an almost 85% chance of a first quarter point rate cut in April. [GVD/EUR]

In currencies, the dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of currencies of other major trading partners, was down 0.04% .

The dollar rose 0.3% against the yen to 148.09 but the euro was up 0.1% on the day at $1.0855, having lost 1.64% in a month.

In Treasuries, the yield on benchmark 10-year Treasury notes rose to 4.1412% compared with its U.S. close of 4.132% on Thursday. The two-year yield, which rises with traders' expectations of higher Fed fund rates, touched 4.3571% compared with a U.S. close of 4.314%.

In commodities, oil prices settled higher as positive U.S. economic growth and signs of Chinese stimulus boosted demand sentiment, while Middle East supply concerns added support.

U.S. crude settled up 0.84% at $78.01 a barrel, their highest settlement level since Nov. 29. Brent crude finished at $83.55 per barrel up 1.36% on the day for their highest closing level since Nov. 30.

In precious metals, spot gold prices fell 0.06% to $2,018.58 an ounce as investors' attention shifted to the Fed's policy meeting next week as they waited for insights into the interest rate outlook.

Earlier in Asia, MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares excluding Japan closed down on the day but snapped a three-week losing streak for a 1.6% weekly rise.

China's CSI blue-chip index dipped on Friday but scored a near 2% weekly gain after three weeks of losses.

Investors poured almost $12 billion into Chinese equity funds in the week to Wednesday, a BofA Global Research report calculated on Friday. That marks the largest inflow since 2015 and the second largest ever.

(Reporting by Sinéad Carew in New York, Marc Jones in London, Amruta Khandekar in Bengaluru; Editing by Alex Richardson, Mark Potter and Diane Craft)

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