Wall Street Close: Indexes throw in the towel on turnaround-Thursday
- Indexes fall: Dow 1.31%, S&P 1.23%, Nasdaq 2.29%.
- US jobless claims post surprise increase.
- US coronavirus cases accelerate and Florida is running out of ICU beds.
Wall Street's benchmarks dropped sharply on Thursday in an exodus of technology shares due to mixed earnings reports and growing signs of a worsening coronavirus pandemic.
Just about every US data release disappointed, and as nervousness on the geopolitical front grows.
Investors are weighing the likelihood of an exacerbated deep economic recession which cut the US indexes down to size.
All three major U.S. stock averages lost ground, with falling momentum stocks Apple, Microsoft Corp MSFT and Amazon.com AMZN weighing heaviest.
The major headline was with the tech watchdog group reporting that Apple Inc AAPL faces consumer protection investigations in multiple states.
The Nasdaq Composite IXIC dropped 244.71 points, or 2.29%, to 10,461.42. The Dow Jones Industrial Average DJI fell 353.51 points, or 1.31%, to 26,652.33.
The bellwether S&P 500 slid more than 1%, losing 40.36 points, or 1.23%, to 3,235.66, snapping a four-day winning streak with its biggest daily percentage drop since June 26.
Of the 11 major sectors in the S&P 500, eight closed in the red, with tech shares S5INFT notching the largest percentage drop.
US coronavirus cases topped 4 million on Thursday
Meanwhile, the coronavirus situation is getting worse, a lot worse.
Total US coronavirus cases topped 4 million on Thursday, with nearly 2,600 new cases every hour, on average, according to a Reuters tally.
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Hospitals in Florida had no available beds in intensive care units, US cases accelerate
US jobless claims unexpectedly ticked higher to 1.416 million last week, the Labor Department said. The number excludes recipients of Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, set to expire on July 31, re-igniting fears of unemployment down the track.
The “miss” wasn’t large – with weekly claims for the week to 18 July at 1416k against expectations of a fall to 1300k, but it was enough to spook the market, and comes at a time when Congress is negotiating a new package to help tens of thousands of American workers who are set to lose benefits at the end of this month,
analysts at ANZ Bank explained.
Continuing claims for the prior week fell more than expected, but the Kansas City Fed’s manufacturing index didn’t recover as well as had been expected.
In the background, Congress kept working to pass new stimulus before that deadline continued, with Senate Republicans announcing they could present their version of the bill to Democrats as early as this week.
S&P 500 levels
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