NEW YORK: Investors in major US stock indexes continue to remain focused on the Federal Reserve, as the Fed is expected to cut its benchmark interest rate later this month for the first time in more than a decade to help counter slowing economic growth caused by various trade disputes.
The major US stock indexes closed at record highs on Friday, with the S&P 500 ending above 3,000 for the first time. The market was driven higher by technology, consumer discretionary and industrial company stocks, which more than offset the drop in drugmakers.
Investors have bet heavily that the Fed is moving that direction, moving stock and bond yields higher in the last two weeks.
Health care stocks took some of the heaviest losses. Eli Lilly, Merck and Pfizer all fell more than 1 percent. Pharmaceutical companies also fell on Thursday after the White House withdrew a plan to overhaul the rebates that drugmakers pay insurers and distributors. Investors now expect drugmakers may come under renewed pressure to lower prices.
Separately, another drugmaker, Johnson & Johnson, fell 4.1 percent. Bloomberg News reported that the company, a Dow component, is under a criminal investigation for possibly lying to the public about the cancer risks found in its ever-popular baby powder.
Industrial companies did well. DuPont rose 2.9 percent, Emerson Electric added 2.4 percent and Illinois Tool Works climbed 3.1 percent. There was positive economic data out of Europe on Friday. Industrial production rose by 0.9 percent in May, much more than the 0.2 percent gain that economists had been expecting.
Ford rose 2.9 percent after announcing that it would team up with Volkswagen to share costs on self-driving and electric vehicles.
HIGHLIGHTS
• The major US stock indexes closed at record highs on Friday, with the S&P 500 ending above 3,000 for the first time.
• Health care stocks took some of the heaviest losses.
• The yield on the benchmark US 10-year Treasury note was 2.12 percent compared to the multi-year low of 1.95 percent.
Illumina, a genetics toolmaking company, plunged 16.1 percent after the company announced it was lowering its full-year forecast.
Bond yields have been moving higher for several days, a sign that investors have become more confident that the US economy will continue to produce growth, at least for the next several months. On Wednesday, Fed chairman Jerome Powell told Congress that many Fed officials believe a weakening global economy and rising trade tensions have strengthened the case for a rate cut.
The yield on the benchmark US 10-year Treasury note was 2.12 percent compared to the multi-year low of 1.95 percent the bond hit only 10 days ago.
“In our view, the Fed will cut (rates by a quarter of a percentage point) since market expectations are near 90 percent,” Tom Di Galoma, with Seaport Global, wrote in a note to clients.
In other moves, Anheuser-Busch InBev dropped 3 percent after The Wall Street Journal reported that the beer giant was canceling plans to spin off its Asian division into a separate publicly traded company.
Investors are preparing for the start of second-quarter earnings season. Major US banks will start reporting their results on Monday, starting with Citigroup. JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo and Goldman Sachs will report their results on Tuesday.
