Damien J. Troyes, The Associated Press
30 minutes ago
FILE – The New York Stock Exchange in New York, July 3, 2024. Asian stocks fell and European stocks rose after France’s election, Monday, July 8, 2024, split the parliament between the left, center and far right, with no political faction coming close to a majority. (AP Photo/Peter Morgan, File)
NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks were volatile in afternoon trading on Wall Street Monday, hovering near the highs recorded last week.
The S&P 500 was little changed, the Nasdaq rose 0.3%, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average gave up early gains to fall 49 points, or 0.3%, as of 12:03 p.m. Eastern time.
Corning, the specialty glass maker, posted the biggest gain on the market, with its shares rising 10.7% after the company raised its sales outlook.
Shares in Boeing rose 1% after the struggling aircraft maker agreed to plead guilty to fraud charges stemming from two crashes of its 737 Max jetliner that killed 346 people. The government found the company violated an agreement that had given it immunity from prosecution for more than three years.
Entertainment giant Paramount Global fell 2.8% after it agreed to a merger with Skydance.
Traders are keeping their eye on several earnings reports this week, including Delta Air Lines’ earnings release on Thursday.
JPMorgan, Citigroup and Wells Fargo report earnings on Friday, and the banks’ latest earnings releases could give Wall Street a clearer view into how consumers are dealing with rising debt and whether banks are worried about potential payments or late payments.
Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell will address Congress on Tuesday and Wednesday as the central bank keeps its benchmark interest rate at its highest in more than two decades to tame inflation.
The Fed’s goal is to keep inflation at 2% without slowing economic growth too much. Inflation is still weighing on consumers, but it’s down significantly from a peak two years ago. Economic growth has slowed this year but has remained relatively strong thanks to a strong job market and consumer spending.
The central bank is due to get a further update on consumer-level inflation on Thursday, and Wall Street expects the latest government report to show inflation falling to 3.1% in June from 3.3% in May.
A report on inflation at the wholesale level, before costs are passed on to consumers, is due to be released on Friday.
Inflation appears to be stagnating around 3% for most measures. This has made the Fed more cautious and lowered expectations for the number of rate cuts this year. Most experts expect the Fed to cut rates once this year, but not until September. The Fed next meets later this month.
In the bond market, Treasury yields remained relatively stable. The 10-year Treasury yield rose to 4.29% from Friday’s close of 4.28%.
European stocks were mixed after France’s election left parliament split between the left, center and far right, with no party coming close to a majority.
Asian stocks fell.
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AP Business Writers Zimo Zhong and Matt Ott contributed to this report.
