NEW YORK, March 10 — Wall Street’s three major stock indexes closed lower yesterday, with bank stocks creating the biggest drag while investors also worried that today’s jobs report could spur more aggressive interest rate hikes from the Federal Reserve.
Investors were also stressing out before today’s US non-farm payrolls report for February with expectations for large wage increases fuelling inflation worries. Fed Chair Jerome Powell this week exacerbated concerns about upcoming interest rate hikes aimed at fighting stubbornly high inflation. Earlier yesterday, Labour Department data showed initial claims for state unemployment benefits rose 21,000 to a seasonally adjusted 211,000 for the week ended March 4, compared with economist forecasts for 195,000 claims.
Any proof last month’s “gigantic payrolls number wasn’t an anomaly” would serve to “reinforce the market’s anxieties around the Fed’s response to it,” said Mark Luschini, chief investment strategist at Janney Montgomery Scott in Philadelphia. All the S&P’s 11 major industry sectors ended the session lower. Utilities, down 0.8 per cent was the smallest decliner. Consumer staples was the next smallest, down 0.95 per cent, with healthcare .SPXHC down 1 per cent.
Also weighing on the sub-index was Signature Bank, which tumbled 12 per cent to US$90.76 after its crypto-bank peer Silvergate Capital Corp disclosed plans to voluntarily liquidate. Silvergate closed down 42 per cent to US$2.84.
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