Weekly Stock Market Update – The Week That Was
This was an eventful week for the global stock market. The SP500 index started the week on a quietly bearish day with weak volume on Monday.
On Tuesday at 9:45AM it all changed with a single news squawk. The Republican healthcare bill had trouble gathering enough support to pass. The market rushed to sell out of their risk positions, causing the first 1% drop in equities since the presidential election.
This was a different type of selling, that came with haste and real pressure. Buyers were quickly absorbed and stopped out as the market carved out lower daily lows. As any good down market does, it closed weak and on the daily lows. It looked like things were going to get ugly for the rest of the week.
The rest of the week was full of range bound trading, as news hit the tape about the healthcare bill. It looks like it might pass, it looks like it won’t, it looks like it might. It went back and forth until Friday, causing a consolidation on high volume in the index.
Friday the big news came at 3:35PM EST, President Trump pulled the healthcare bill from the floor to avoid an embarrassing loss in a vote scenario. This was a big blow for the Republican party, and the president himself.
Now the next question is, with the healthcare bill dead in its tracks, where will the budget savings come from to implement the tax reform and infrastructure spending that was pivotal in his campaign?
For that answer, you’ll have to tune in next week.
Now let’s look across the quote board and see how markets closed on Friday.
Weekly Stock Market Update – Asset Class Weekly Overview
- SP500 equities finished trading at -1.28% this week
- Oil prices settled at -1.26%
- The US dollar ended at -0.5%
- Gold was up 2% at the highs of the week, to settle at 1.4%
- Silver was the winner of the week, finishing near the highs at over 2.00%
Weekly Stock Market Update – Stock Market Sector Overview
- Utilities were up 1.09% in wake of the sell-off (orange)
- Technology sector closed own -0.94% (purple)
- Energy sector closed down -1.05%
- Financials took the brunt of the beating, down over -3.10%
Weekly Stock Market Update – Next Week’s Economic Calendar
The big events this week are Monday’s Consumer Confidence number at 10AM, as well as the Final GDP Q/Q release on Thursday at 8:30AM EST.
Aside from that, we have a swamped economic calendar in the US, Europe and Asia! This promises to be an eventful week.
Have a great trading week!
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