Stock markets in the United States performed quite well Tuesday amid the release of manufacturing reports, thus palliating concerns about the recent partial government shutdown.
Stock markets in the United States performed quite well Tuesday amid the release of manufacturing reports, thus palliating concerns about the recent partial government shutdown. Manufacturing activity, according to the Institute of Supply Management, had gained by its fastest pace in over two years, as the ISM manufacturing index gained to 56.2 last month, from the previous month’s 55.7.
With the September 2013 quarter over, the first trading day of the December 2013 quarter started positively, just days after multi-week lows were reached. As such, the government shutdown caused several reports to be delayed or outright cancelled, such as the construction spending report and the nonfarm payroll report. The technological and financial sectors led the way in October 1 trading, as all ten sectors of the Standard & Poor’s 500 experienced gains at the start of the quarter.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average ticked up by 0.4 percent yesterday to close at 15,191.70, while the S&P 500 gained 0.8 percent to close at 1,695.00. The tech-centric NASDAQ Composite Index gained more substantially, improving by 1.2 percent to finish October 1 at 3,817.98. Deep-diving into other stock figures for October 1, the CBOE Volatility Index, which measures risk and concerns in the stock market, dipped by 6.4 percent to 15.54.
Consolidated volumes encompassing the New York Stock Exchange, NASDAQ and the American Stock Exchange were at approximately 6 billion shares, down slightly from the 2013 average of 6.3 billion. More stocks experienced gains than those that experienced losses – 69 percent of companies saw their share prices tick up, as to only 27 percent moving down.
Of particular interest was the tech sector, which performed quite well on October 1, as Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) Chief Executive Tim Cook met investor Carl Icahn for a dinner tete-a-tete about the latter’s plans to buy back $150 billion of AAPL stocks. Following the Cook/Icahn summit, Apple stocks have edged closer to $500 per share, and are now at $489.56 per share at the close of yesterday’s trading.