U.S. stocks opened lower on Friday after Wall Street closed largely unchanged the previous day amid soft trading volumes in a holiday-shortened week. Amid the absence of market-moving cues, investors reacted to a slight rise in U.S. government bond yields, including the benchmark. However, a robust seven-year note auction in the early afternoon yesterday helped ease yields somewhat. The 10-year Treasury yield stands at 4.59% as of Friday morning.
Higher yields make bonds more attractive relative to equities, prompting a shift in investor capital away from tech stocks. Rising yields also translate into increased borrowing costs, which can constrain spending on innovation and expansion, further squeezing profit margins. The Labor Department reported a decrease of 1,000 in initial applications for state unemployment benefits, bringing the seasonally adjusted figure to 219,000 for the week that ended on December 21. This figure is lower than the 224,000 claims that economists had predicted for the same week. Meanwhile, the number of individuals receiving benefits after their first week of aid, which serves as an indication of hiring, increased by 46,000. This brought the seasonally adjusted total to 1.910 million for the week that ended on December 14, the highest since November 2021. Economists had previously anticipated the number of these continued claims to be 1.880 million. Contrasting signals from the data backs the Fed’s view of leaning toward a cautious approach, holding rates steady while monitoring labor market trends.
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