Wall Street finishes week mixed despite trade optimism

US President Trump says China wants to make a deal on trade.
Consumer discretionary underperforms on weak data.
Crude oil recovery helps energy extend rally.

Eren Sengezer FXStreet

After starting the last day of the week modestly higher, major equity indexes in the U.S. finished the day mixed amid the varying performances of major sectors.

Earlier in the session, US President Donald Trump said that the U.S. may not have to impose further tariffs on China. "China wants to make a deal on trade, but it is not acceptable yet," Trump added to improve the market sentiment. The trade-sensitive S&P 500 Materials Index added 1.1% on the day while the S&P 500 Industrias closed flat as the lower-than-expected growth in industrial production capped gains. Commenting on the market reaction, "We caught a little bit of a rally on the president's quotes on the upcoming meeting with China," Mark Kepner, equity trader at Themis Trading in Chatham, New Jersey, told Reuters.

Meanwhile, disappointing Q3 sales figures from retail giant Nordstrom weighed on the S&P 500 Consumer Discretionary Index, which lost 0.55% on the day to become the worst performing major sector of the day. Additionally, a sharp drop witnessed in chip-maker Nvidia's shares forced the S&P 500 Technology Index to stay in the negative territory at the end of the day.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 123.95 points, or 0.49%, to 25,413.22, the S&P 500 rose 5.94 points, or 0.22%, to 2,736.14, and the Nasdaq Composite fell 11.16 points, or 0.15%, to 7,247.87. For the week, these three major indexes lost 2.22%, 1.61%, and 2.15%, respectively.

Author

Eren Sengezer

FXStreet

As an economist at heart, Eren Sengezer specializes in the assessment of the short-term and long-term impacts of macroeconomic data, central bank policies and political developments on financial assets.

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