WALL STREET ENDED LOWER
by Lewis Krauskopf, Bansari Mayur Kamdar et Praveen Paramasivam
(Archyde.com) – The New York Stock Exchange ended lower on Wednesday after the release of the minutes of the March monetary policy meeting of the United States Federal Reserve (Fed) showing the latter’s plan to gradually reduce its balance sheet.
The Dow Jones index fell 0.42%, or 144.67 points, to 34,496.51 points.
The broader S&P-500 fell 43.97 points, or 0.97%, to 4,481.15 points.
The Nasdaq Composite fell for its part by 315.35 points (2.22%) to 13,888.82 points.
According to the “minutes” of the March 15-16 meeting, Fed officials “broadly agreed” to trim the central bank’s balance sheet by $95 billion a month over three months or “slightly more.” “.
Ahead of the publication of the Fed minutes, the main Wall Street indices were already clearly in the red, as the day before following comments by one of the Fed governors, Lael Brainard, having fueled fears tighter central bank policy to fight inflation.
“The Fed is determined to control inflation and we hope there will be a soft landing for the economy, not a hard landing plunging us into recession,” commented Tim Ghriskey, strategist at Ingalls & Snyder.
Declines in big tech stocks and high-growth stocks weighed on major Wall Street indexes, with the S&P-500 tech sector falling about 2.6%.
Like the healthcare and real estate sectors, both up 1.6%, the so-called defensive sectors recorded gains.
The prospect of more aggressive Fed policy rattled markets at the start of the year, weighing heavily on big tech stocks, which are more sensitive to rising US Treasury yields.
This climate of concern was fueled by the war in Ukraine, particularly for its inflationary effect on commodity prices.
(French version Jean Terzian)