As of Fri, Apr 26, Singapore Time zone UTC+8
Dollar Index, -0.03%, $98.14
USDJPY, -0.57%, $111.54
EURUSD, -0.17%, $1.1135
GBPUSD, -0.06%, $1.2895
USDCAD, -0.09%, $1.3479
AUDUSD, +0.01%, $0.7017
NZDUSD, +0.59%, $0.6632
U.S. Treasuries finished slightly lower, pushing yields slightly higher. The 2-yr yield and the 10-yr yield increased one basis point each to 2.31% and 2.53%, respectively. The U.S. Dollar Index finished unchanged at 98.14. WTI crude lost 1.0% to $65.17/bbl.
In growth, South Korea reported a 0.3% qtr/qtr contraction in first quarter GDP, marking its worst performance since the global financial crisis, as companies slashed investment and exports slumped in response to Sino-U.S. trade tensions and cooling Chinese demand. From a year earlier, the Korean economy grew 1.8% in the January-March quarter, and 3.1% in the final quarter of 2018.
The Bank of Japan signaled rates will be kept at extremely low levels until at least the spring of 2020; and 3M attributed its poor results to slowing conditions in China and other end markets.
Slowing global growth, though, really hasn’t deterred investors from U.S. stocks this year. The U.S. economy, after all, appears to remain in solid footing. The latest economic data yesterday showed durable goods orders increase 2.7% m/m in March (consensus +0.7%).
S&P500, -0.04%, 2,926.17
Nasdaq, +0.42%, 7,816.92
Nikkei Futures, -0.05%, 22,160.0
S&P 500 (-0.04%) finished fractionally lower on Thursday, although strong earnings reports from Facebook (FB 193.26, +10.68, +5.9%) and Microsoft (MSFT 129.15, +4.14, +3.3%) helped the broader market overcome early weakness stemming from 3M (MMM 190.72, -28.36, -13.0%) and other industrial stocks.
The 13% drop in 3M carried the most weight with shares of UPS (UPS 105.13, -9.30, -8.1%), Raytheon (RTN 177.37, -8.08, -4.4%), Rockwell Automation (ROK 176.22, -12.68, -6.7%), and Masco (MAS 37.50, -2.49, -6.2%) following suit. Visa (V 161.02, -0.47, -0.3%), Tesla (TSLA 247.63, -11.03, -4.3%), Chipotle Mexican Grill (CMG 678.07, -31.68, -4.5%), and Xilinx (XLNX 115.86, -23.86, -17.1%) also fell following their results.