Market Recap for Week of 5/11—5/15
The Dow had its’ first three-day losing streak since March to start the week. The S&P 500 hit all-time highs on Thursday and Friday, thanks to weakness in the U.S. dollar. Despite the record, it was a relatively tame week for stocks, as the Dow and S&P were up less than 0.5%…
Monday Wall Street continued to react to the previous week’s jobs report, with stocks turning slightly negative as investors began to accept the likelihood of an interest rate hike sometime in 2015. The reaction was muted, however, as most experts believed the week’s data reports would tell the real story. For Monday, the Dow was down 85 points.
Tuesday, stocks started the day sharply down as a selloff in bonds took its toll. U.S. 10-year Treasury yields reached 2.36 Tuesday morning, by far their highest point in 2015. However, throughout the day those yields retreated, and so did the losses on Wall Street. For the day, the Dow was down 36 points.
Wednesday stocks started higher, but turned down quickly as investors were disappointed by retail sales figures that stayed flat for April. Experts had expected an increase of at least 0.3%. The market struggled to find direction the rest of the day, and the Dow closed down 7 points.
Thursday the Dow rose more than 100 points at the start of trading, as investors showed excitement at the declining value of the dollar. Sounds crazy, right? That’s Wall Street for you. The dollar reached its weakest point in three months (as the Euro topped $1.14.) The result was another new high on the S&P 500, while the Dow went up 191 points.
Friday stocks stayed relatively flat as investors continued to enjoy the weaker dollar, but were subdued by the lowest consumer sentiment report of 2015. Treasury yields continued to decline, moving down to 2.14 by the end of trading. For the day the Dow was up 20 points.
