Around 4:30 p.m., the Dow Jones was treading water (-0.03%), after opening higher; the technology-dominated Nasdaq lost 0.14% and the S&P 500 gleaned 0.13%.
The New York Stock Exchange is hesitant and nervous on Wednesday, awaiting a report from a Fed meeting and after a disappointing manufacturing activity index in the United States for December.
Around 3:30 p.m. GMT, the Dow Jones was treading water (-0.03%), after opening higher; the technology-dominated Nasdaq lost 0.14% and the S&P 500 gleaned 0.13%.
Tuesday, after a long weekend, Wall Street had started the year in the red. The Dow Jones fell 0.03% to 33,136.37 points, the Nasdaq lost 0.76% to 10,386.98 points and the S&P 500 0.40% to 3,824.14 points.
At the opening on Wednesday, “the mood of investors was cautiously optimistic after encouraging data on inflation in Europe,” note analysts at Wells Fargo.
The rise in inflation in France slowed in December to 5.9% over one year, against 6.2% in November, according to the provisional estimate published by INSEE on Wednesday.
In Germany, inflation slowed markedly in December, against a backdrop of calm energy prices and thanks to state aid, before a further rise expected in early 2023, according to provisional data published on Tuesday.
But forty minutes after the opening, the publication of an ISM manufacturing activity index down to 48.4 in December, a little less than expected, halted the momentum in equities.
On the bond market, rates fell to 3.68% for 10-year Treasury bills against 3.73% the day before.
In the second part of the session, the publication of the minutes of the last meeting of the American central bank, the Fed, should “decide on the last hours of exchanges even if investors wonder whether they will learn something new,” said Sam Stovall of CFRA.
At the beginning of December, the Fed had slowed down its pace of rate hikes by raising them by 50 basis points instead of 75 the previous times. But above all the Central Bank had raised its inflation forecast.
The Fed minutes “should shed light on why the Fed has raised its inflation forecast for 2023,” said Art Hogan of B. Riley Wealth Management.
On the side, the title of the American computer group Saleforce, a member of the Dow Jones, gained 2.42% to 138 dollars, hailed for having announced the dismissal of 10% of its employees, or almost 8,000 people.
The group specializing in the distribution of management software and cloud computing (remote computing), has 79,000 employees worldwide.
“As our revenues accelerated during the pandemic, we hired too many people,” Salesforce boss Marc Benioff said in a letter to employees.
Tesla shares, which had fallen by more than 12% after disappointing delivery figures, rose a little to 111.78 dollars (+ 3.44%) at 3:30 p.m. GMT.
Microsoft fell 5.25% to 227 dollars after a degraded note from a banking analyst on activity in the cloud (remote computing). The group has also recognized its first union within its video game subsidiary Zenimax.
The subsidiary of the American conglomerate GE dedicated to the health sector has entered the Nasdaq, marking the first stage of the split of the former industrial giant into three separate companies.
GE HealthCare Technologies is listed under the symbol GEHC, while GE remains registered on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), the other major stock exchange in New York.
Around 4:25 p.m., the GEHC title gained 7.89% to 60.42 dollars.