General Market Comment
US indices closed mixed on Thursday. Shares in the Materials (-0.97%), Banks (-0.6%) and Commercial & Professional Services (-0.49%) sectors ended on a negative note while shares in the Technology Hardware & Equipment (+1.25%), Utilities (+0.96%) and Media (+0.87%) sectors improved higher. On the economic data front, initial jobless claims increased to 214k in week ended September 22nd (estimated 210k) from 202k in the previous week. Continuing claims reached 1.661M in week ended September 15th (forecasted 1.678M) compared to 1.645M a week earlier. In other news, wholesale inventories advanced by 0.8% MoM in a preliminary estimate in August (forecasted 0.3%) vs. 0.6% in July. Durable goods orders jumped by 4.5% in a preliminary estimate in August (expected 2%) from a decline of 1.2% in the prior month. In addition, pending home sales decreased by 1.8% MoM in August (estimated -0.5%) vs. -0.8% in July. The Bloomberg consumer comfort index improved to 61.2 in week ended September 23rd from 60.2 in the previous week. Finally, the annualized GDP remained unchanged QoQ in a third estimate at 4.2%, as expected. The S&P 500 (2,914.00) remains above its 20d moving average (2,900.86 – flat slope) and 50d moving average (2,865.99 – positive slope). read more