Stocks ended Thursday's session mixed, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 ending lower while the Nasdaq climbed slightly higher, as investors continued the seasonally weak market trends that usually wash over Wall Street in September.
Here's how the market settled on Thursday:
S&P 500 Index
Dow Jones Industrial Average
Nasdaq Composite Index
Initial jobless claims rise from pandemic-era low last week:
Initial jobless claims rose from the latest pandemic-era low last week, but continued to show improvements as the labor market continues to recovery from the coronavirus pandemic's impact.
New weekly unemployment claims totaled 332,000 for the week ended Sept. 11, above both the 322,000 expected by consensus expectations and 312,000 revised total for the prior week. Still, continuing jobless claims continues to recover, totalling 2.665 million for the week of Sept.4, which was down from the 2.740 million expected and 2.783 million reported the previous week.
At the start of September, initial jobless claims reached their lowest level since March 2020. New unemployment claims averaged a rate of about 222,000 per month throughout 2019, which reflects a healthy jobs market.
Retail sales unexpectedly rose in August:
U.S. retail sales unexpectedly rose in August after falling in July, signalling that consumers fared much better than fear from the latest COVID wave driven by the Delta variant.
Sales increased by 0.7% for the month, versus a drop of 0.7% expected, according to Bloomberg consensus data.
The month's increase was driven by multiple categories beneath the headline, with e-commerce sales rising by 5.3%, furniture and home furniture store sales climbing by 37%, and general merchandise stores' sales increasing by 3.5%.
Food services and drinking places sales were flat on the month, while clothing and accessory store sales increased by just 0.1%.
Here's how benchmarks started trading soon after market open:
S&P 500 Index: -0.09% or -4.08 points to 4,476.62
Dow Jones Industrial Average: +0.18% or +61.34 points to 34,875.73
Nasdaq Composite Index: -0.32% or -48.21 points to 15,113.32
