Wall Street ended Thursday's volatile session on a mixed note as investors weighed steady high jobless claims data against the Federal Reserve's new framework to address interest rates and unemployment. Major benchmarks struggled to extend their gains, with the S&P 500 and Dow Jones advancing, but the Nasdaq fell behind as tech stocks lagged.
Fed Chairman Jerome Powell unveiled a new central bank policy on Thursday that would tolerate inflation to moderately rise above the Fed's target of 2%. This could keep interest rates lower for a longer period of time, a move the Fed hopes will keep the economy functional during a time of uncertainty.
Meanwhile, the Labor Department's unemployment claims data for the week ended August 22 was slightly above consensus at 1.006 million new claims. Continuing claims remained steady, coming in at 14.535 million for the week ended August 15. This is the second consecutive week of claims exceeding one million following a prior break in the pandemic's unemployment streak.
Here's how the market settled on Thursday:
S&P 500 Index
Dow Jones Industrial Average
Nasdaq Composite Index
For Major Stock News, big banks--Bank of America
For Sector Performance, most market industries ended the day in positive territory, with only Communication Services -1.29%, Consumer Discretionary -0.72% and Materials -0.24% lagging behind. The sector performance gains were as follows: Financials +1.74%, Real Estate +1.37%, Health Care +0.78%, Consumer Staples +0.61%, Industrials +0.33%, Utilities +0.30%, Energy +0.25% and Information Technology +0.03%.
For Commodities and Currency, the U.S. Dollar
For Friday, market participants will focus on fresh data on consumer sentiment and personal income.