S&P 500 remains near record high after jobs report

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• Friday, July 5, 2024, 10:15 a.m. EDT

  Stocks rise in morning trading

  Below are some of the stocks that led Yahoo Finance’s trending ticker page during morning trading on Friday.

  Tesla (TSLA): Tesla shares were down slightly after investors boosted the electric-vehicle maker’s shares by nearly 25% over the past week after the company reported vehicle deliveries that beat Wall Street expectations. More broadly, investors are looking to a positive quarterly report later this month and a robotaxi launch in early August that bullish analysts predict will shape the next phase of Tesla’s story. The stock was down less than 1% in morning trading.

  Coinbase (coin): The cryptocurrency market is in turmoil, and crypto companies are being dragged down with it. Cryptocurrency exchanges fell 5% reflecting the price drop of Bitcoin (BTC-USD), the most popular cryptocurrency and the largest by market capitalization, which dropped to its lowest since February. Cryptocurrency miner Marathon (MARA) fell 7%, and online broker Robinhood (HOOD) fell 4%.

  Macy’s (Ma): Shares in the struggling department store chain rose nearly 10% on Friday morning after reports that a group of investors had made a second takeover bid for the company, the latest for $300 million more than the previous offer.

  Samsung Electronics (005930.KS): Shares in the manufacturing conglomerate rose 3% on Friday morning to a three-year high after the company said its quarterly profit surged 15 times from the same period a year ago, fueled by the AI ​​boom.

• 

  Friday, July 5, 2024 at 9:33 a.m. EDT

  Stocks hold steady as unemployment rises

  U.S. stocks hovered near record highs on Friday as investors analyzed how June jobs data, showing a slight increase in the unemployment rate, might affect the Federal Reserve’s interest rate decision.

  The S&P 500 (^GSPC) was little changed following the report. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) was below flat, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index (^IXIC) was above flat. Friday’s trading session continued the action from Wednesday, with all three indexes closed on Thursday for the Independence Day holiday.

• 

  Friday, July 5, 2024 at 8:59 a.m. EDT

  Pressure grows for Federal Reserve action

  There’s no question what story will emerge from Friday’s jobs report, and the Fed runs the risk of falling behind.

  That means it may end up being too late for central banks to cut interest rates, just as many believe it was too late to raise them in 2022.

  With the unemployment rate at its highest level since November 2021, other data, including continued increases in jobless claims and declining job openings, are beginning to seem like a clear signal that headlines about job gains are overstating the strength of the labor market.

  Inflation data continues to slow toward the Fed’s 2% target, but progress appears to have stalled in the first few months of the year.

  A key feature of this policy regime is that Powell Fed is sensitive to above-target inflation data after recording the highest level of price growth in 40 years in 2022. But the labor market is speaking louder and more clearly: things are getting tougher for more workers.

  Neil Dutta of Renaissance Macro has led Wall Street opinion that the Fed needs to cut rates more forcefully this fall. “Today’s jobs report should bolster expectations of a September rate cut. Economic conditions are cooling, creating different trade-offs for the Fed,” he wrote in a note just minutes after Friday’s jobs report was released.

  In Datta’s view, the Fed’s July meeting should set the stage for a rate cut in September.

• 

  Friday, July 5, 2024 at 8:54 a.m. EDT

  Job gains beat expectations, but unemployment rate rises to highest level since 2021

  While the U.S. labor market saw more jobs added than expected in June, the unemployment rate unexpectedly rose to its highest level since November 2021, signaling a continued cooling in the job market.

  The U.S. economy added 206,000 nonfarm payroll jobs in June, beating economists’ expectations of 190,000, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data released on Friday.

  The unemployment rate rose to 4.1 percent from 4 percent last month, the highest level in nearly three years. Payrolls fell slightly in June from May. The May payroll gain was revised down to 218,000 on Friday from the 272,000 initially reported last month.

  Stock futures rose following the report, adding to a rally after markets traded at record highs amid a series of weaker-than-expected economic data earlier this week, including an inflation reading that suggested the U.S. was returning to a “disinflationary path.” Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said: