S&P nears all-time high stocks rise ahead of Fed decision

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• Tue, September 17, 2024 at 8:27 AM PDT

  Investors increasingly expect a soft landing

  From Yahoo Finance’s Josh Schafer:

  “Investors are growing increasingly confident that the global economy can achieve a soft landing, in which inflation retreats without a large drawdown in economic activity.

  In Bank of America’s August Global Fund Manager Survey, released on Tuesday, 79% of respondents said a soft landing is the most likely outcome for the global economy in the next 12 months. This marked the highest percentage of respondents projecting such an outcome since May 2023.”

  Read the full story >

• 

  Tue, September 17, 2024 at 8:19 AM PDT

  Housing stocks face risks despite expected rate cuts: BofA

  Homebuilder stocks have been rallying since early July, driven by relatively lower mortgage rates, but a new note from Bank of America detailed three risks after the Fed starts cutting interest rates.

  First, a weakening job market — if it led to an economic downturn. Homebuilder stocks generally outperform during times of rising unemployment and declining rates. However, “they typically underperform ahead of a recession,” Rafe Jadrosich, research analyst at Bank of America, wrote in the note to clients Tuesday morning.

  Second, mortgage rates “have already priced in significant rate cuts.” Wednesday’s expected Fed rate cut has led to the average rate on a 30-year fixed mortgage being at 6.2%, its lowest level in over a year. The BofA mortgage-backed securities team “forecasts mortgage rates of 5.75%-6% by year end.”

  Third, homebuilders are trading at over two times their price-to-book ratio, which is “elevated compared to historical multiples and prior periods heading into Fed rate cut cycles.”

  The SPDR S&P Homebuilders ETF (XHB) has jumped more than 27% year-to-date, while the iShares US Home Construction ETF (ITB) has surged nearly 24%.

• 

  Tue, September 17, 2024 at 8:08 AM PDT

  Stocks trending in morning trading

  Here are some of the stocks leading Yahoo Finance’s trending tickers page during morning trading on Tuesday:

  Microsoft (MSFT): Shares of the tech giant are climbing in morning trading hours after the board approved a $60 billion share buyback program and agreed to raise the dividend by 10% to $0.83 per share as of November 21. The move continues a recent wave of investor return programs among the major tech platforms that have initiated or boosted stock buybacks and dividends.

  Intel’s (INTC): The technology company gained more than 6% Tuesday morning after its foundry secured Amazon (AMZN) as a multibillion-dollar customer for AI chips. As part of the deal, which expands on an existing partnership between the companies, Intel will build custom AI chips for Amazon’s cloud services business.

  Shopify (SHOP): Shares of the e-commerce shopping platform climbed 2% after Redburn Atlantic upgraded the company to Buy and raised its price target to $99 per share, citing its social e-commerce growth. That represents a more than 30% upside from Monday’s closing price.

  Icahn Enterprises (IEP): The conglomerate named after activist investor Carl Icahn rose almost 10% after it said that a judge dismissed a proposed class-action lawsuit against the company. The short-selling firm Hindenburg had brought a lawsuit against Icahn Enterprises, alleging that it artificially inflated its share price by issuing unsustainably high dividends in order to allow the billionaire investor to secure large personal loans.

• 

  Tue, September 17, 2024 at 7:00 AM PDT

  Homebuilder confidence rises in September ahead of expected rate cut

  Homebuilders are feeling more confident about the housing market as mortgage rates sit at their lowest level since February 2023.

  The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB)/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index rose two points to 41 in September from the previous month, breaking a streak of four consecutive monthly declines.

  September’s reading was in line with economists’ estimates of 41, per Bloomberg data.

  “Thanks to lower interest rates, builders now have a positive view for future new home sales for the first time since May 2024,” NAHB Chairman Carl Harris, a custom homebuilder from Wichita, Kan., wrote in a press statement.

  Mortgage rates have been on the slide in recent months, hitting their lowest level in over a year as investors anticipate rate cuts from the Fed this month. The central bank will issue its next policy decision on Wednesday.

  Lower mortgage rates have benefited builders as they pulled back on concessions. The survey found that 32% of builders cut home prices to bolster sales in September, compared with 33% in August, and that the average price reduction was 5% — the lowest since July 2022.

  The gauge of the sales outlook over the next six months, meanwhile, rose 4 points to 53. The prospective-buyer traffic gauge and the NAHB index of current sales conditions also both rose two points and one point, respectively.

• 

  Tue, September 17, 2024 at 6:58 AM PDT

  Musings from Dreamforce

  Greetings once more from San Francisco, this time from Salesforce’s (CRM) big annual gathering known as Dreamforce. This I believe is my fifth Dreamforce and I have to say, each one is more surprising and different than the last.

  Take my experience last night.

  I am sipping a water during cocktail hour (hey, it’s a work night) at the Time AI 100 dinner (note: Time is owned by Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff and his wife Lynne) and see AMD (AMD) CEO Dr. Lisa Su standing in the corner with her husband. So of course, I go over and say hello and start a chat.

  Somewhere in the convo I remark I have to leave work and go back to school to learn more about AI. She actually advised me against doing that, acknowledging the tech is moving so quickly that the industry is learning on the fly in many respects.

  That left me concerned about AI safety (something further amplified during the chats I had at the dinner table) and the impact to jobs from this rapidly unfolding technology. But it also reinforced the notion that even one year from now, a lot of companies across different industries will see big margin gains as AI spreads internally through their workflows.

  The question I am left wondering on is if the market has priced all of this into stocks.

  Nevertheless, below is what Su told me last week about the future of AI at the Goldman Sachs tech and media conference.

• 

  Tue, September 17, 2024 at 6:40 AM PDT

  Retail sales top Wall Street estimates in August

  Retail sales surpassed Wall Street’s estimates in August as investors kept a close eye on any signs of a slowdown in consumer spending. The data comes as the Federal Reserve’s two-day policy meeting kicks off in Washington, with the central bank widely expected to cut interest rates as economic growth data slows and inflation lessens.

  Retail sales rose 0.1% in August. Economists had expected a 0.2% decrease in spending, according to Bloomberg data. Meanwhile, retail sales in July were revised to a 1.1% increase from a prior reading that showed sales increased by 1% in the month, according to Census Bureau data.

  “The stronger than expected retail sales data for August suggest that, boosted by rapid wealth gains and falling energy prices, consumers continue to spend freely despite the labour market slowdown,” Capital Economics North America economist Olivia Cross wrote in a note to clients on Tuesday.

  The release comes as investors widely expect the Fed will cut interest rates for the first time since 2020 when its next policy decision is announced at 2 p.m. ET on Wednesday.

  “I don’t think this changes really anything,” BofA Securities senior US economist Stephen Juneau told Yahoo Finance. “It’s kind of a nonevent.”

  On Tuesday morning, markets were pricing in a 67% chance that the Fed cuts interest rates by 50 basis points, compared to 33% odds that the Fed opts for a smaller 25 basis point cut, per the CME FedWatch Tool.

• 

  Tue, September 17, 2024 at 6:31 AM PDT

  Stocks open higher ahead of key Fed decision

  Stocks rose on Tuesday, with techs leading the advance, as investors assessed fresh retail sales data in the wait for a Federal Reserve meeting pivotal to an interest rate cut.

  The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) moved up roughly 0.2%, coming off a record-high close for the blue-chip index. The S&P 500 (^GSPC) added about 0.4%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) put on 0.7%.