US stocks drifted to a mixed close Monday and bond yields jumped as elections continued to drive swings in financial markets worldwide.
- The S&P 500 rose 14.61 points, or 0.3%, to 5,475.09, even though three out of every four stocks within the index fell.
- The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 50.66, or 0.1% to 39,169.52 .
- The Nasdaq composite rose 146.70, or 0.8% to 17,879.30.
Some of the world's strongest action was in Paris, where stocks jumped after election results bolstered financial markets' hopes for a gridlocked government that won't drive up its debt, the
AP reports.
Hopes for rate cuts strengthened after a report on Monday showed US manufacturing weakened last month by more than economists expected. Perhaps even more importantly for Wall Street, the report from the Institute for Supply Management also said price increases are decelerating, even if prices are still rising. Taken together, the data could offer more of the evidence of lessening pressure on inflation that the Federal Reserve wants before it will cut rates.
This week's highlight for economic reports will likely arrive on Friday, when the US government will say how many workers were added to payrolls during June. Economists predict overall hiring slowed to 190,000 from May's 272,000. That would get the number closer to what Bank of America calls the "Goldilocks" figure of roughly 150,000, give or take 25,000. At that level, the US economy could continue to grow and avoid a recession, without being so strong that it puts too much upward pressure on inflation.
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On Wall Street, Chewy swung from a big early gain to a loss of 6.6% after a widely followed trader named Keith Gill revealed he owned just over 9 million shares of the pet supply company. That's almost 7% of the entire company, according to a filing made Monday with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Spirit AeroSystems rose 3.4% after Boeing said it would buy the maker of fuselages and other airplane parts for $4.7 billion in stock and assume about $3.6 billion of its debt. Boeing rose 2.5%.
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