Jarden Brief: All major US indices in the red

The S&P 500, Nasdaq and the Dow Jones Industrial Average all declined. Photo / AP

Keeping you up to date with the latest market moves, in association with Investment firm Jarden

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US

All major US indices were down at the time of writing. The S&P 500 fell 0.5 per cent, the Nasdaq dropped 0.9 per cent and the Dow Jones Industrial Average declined 0.1 per cent.

Eight of the 11 sectors were in the red. Bottom performing sectors were energy (-2.2 per cent), communication services (-1.7) and materials (-1.2 per cent).

The top sector gainers were consumer staples (+0.5 per cent) and real estate (+0.2 per cent).

United Airlines led the outperformers, rising 11.5 per cent. This followed a company outlook by the chief executive officer who said it expects to return to profitability in 2022 for the first time since before the pandemic, as travel bounces bank.

American Airlines followed with a 5.7 per cent increase at the time of writing. Shares of the country's biggest airline rose after the company forecasted second-quarter sales as much as 8.0 per cent higher than the same period three years ago, as strong bookings help cover soaring fuel costs.

Tesla rallied 5.5 per cent after reporting better-than-expected first-quarter results, as the company saw an increase in car deliveries and outlook commentary from Elon Musk which suggested accelerating growth.

Conversely, Enphase Energy was the biggest laggard and continued its trend from yesterday, losing another 11.4 per cent at the time of writing. Despite the fall, the global energy technology company announced growing sales, as rising electricity prices and power outages continue to motivate households to seek resilient clean energy solutions.

Freeport-McMoRan dropped 9.7 per cent at the time of writing. The gold and copper miner reported a quarterly earnings report of US$1.07 per share, compared to US$0.51 per share a year ago, but trimmed its outlook for quarterly copper sales. Despite the loss today, Freeport-McMoRan has soared 21.7 per cent over the past three months.

The energy technology company Generac joined the bottom movers, falling 9.3 per cent. This may be related to rising oil prices, which has been a common obstacle for energy companies.

Rest of the world

Asian market results were varied overnight. The Shanghai Composite lost 2.3 per cent, the Nikkei gained 1.2 per cent and the Hang Seng declined 1.3 per cent.

European markets closed mostly in the green. The FTSE remained unchanged. The DAX closed with a gain of 1.0 per cent and the CAC increased by 1.0 per cent.

Commodities

Gold traded 0.3 per cent lower at US$1,949.80 per ounce.

WTI Crude Oil rose 0.7 per cent to US$102.85 per barrel, following a loss in the previous session.

The Cryptocurrency market was on the rise, with Bitcoin up 1.1 per cent and Ethereum remaining unchanged.

The US 10-year Treasury rate rose nine basis points to 2.925 per cent.

New Zealand

The NZX 50 fell 0.2 per cent yesterday.

The top performer was film technology company Vista Group International with a gain of 4.1 per cent.

Milk nutrition producer Synlait Milk and retirement village operator Arvida Group were up 2.4 per cent.

The largest fall in price on Thursday belonged to Fonterra's Shareholder's Fund, decreasing 3.3 per cent.

Donations payment provider Pushpay Holdings also underperformed, declining 1.9 per cent. The company is now down 43.8 per cent year on year.

Sky TV rounded out the bottom performers, down 1.8 per cent. Despite this loss yesterday, Sky TV is 55.5 per cent above its share price this time last year.

Statistics NZ reported the March 2022 quarter Consumer Price Index yesterday, with annual inflation rising to 6.9 per cent for the year ended 31 March. This increase was the largest since the June 1990 quarter but hit just below the market expectations of 7 per cent and above.

Annual inflation has now been above 3 per cent for four quarters and is well above the Reserve Bank's target range of 1-3 per cent. Economists are now anticipating a further 50 basis point increase in the Official Cash Rate at the Reserve Bank's next Monetary Policy meeting in May, and further increases in the second half of the year.

The three biggest forces for the increase in annual inflation came from housing and household utilities (+ 8.6 per cent), transport (+14 per cent) and food (+6.7 per cent).

Quarterly inflation was 1.8 per cent higher, led by food, up 3.1 per cent, housing and household utilities rising 1.8 per cent and transport increasing 3.3 per cent.

Australia

The ASX 200 gained 0.3 per cent to 7,592.8 points yesterday.

Industrials led sector performance, up 2.2 per cent. Real estate investment trusts and utilities followed suit, gaining 2.0 and 1.6 per cent, respectively. Closing in the red were information technology (-2.6 per cent) and materials (-1.6 per cent).

The largest increase belonged to the investment firm Challenger, rising 9.8 per cent. This may be due to a quarterly report where the company noted expectations of full-year net profit before tax lay at the higher end of its previously forecasted range (A$430 million – A$480 million).

Brambles and property group Lendlease were also up 8.0 and 5.1 per cent, respectively.

Leading the underperformers was Megaport. The network and service provider lost 21.6 per cent of its value Thursday following the release of its third quarter earnings report. While the update showed growth across many metrics, investors may have expected stronger numbers.

Also seeing decreases were information technology company Life360 (-5.3 per cent) and gold producer Evolution Mining (-4.8 per cent).

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